字首字根

學習的好處

After having a taste of etymology, we can start to analyze the benefits of learning etymology,

1. High efficiency - Once you catch one, you learn all.

For example, if you learn the meaning of "gress" from "progress". You will automatically have some senses when you see the word "regress", "transgress" and any other XXXgress. Well goes the Chinese saying, putting two together to get three (舉一反三).

2. Memorize less words to get more.

Try a simple math problem here:

Question:

Assume any two prefixes, roots or suffixes can make into one new word, how many new words will you learn if you study 100 in total of prefixes, roots and suffixes?

Answer : 100*99/2 = 4950 >>>>> 100

Why not learn etymology if it can save your time fifty-ford??

OK, the model is problematic because not any two of them can be made one word in reality. Let's divide by 10

Answer : 4950/10 = 495 >> 100

Still, five times greater!!! (Only math geek learns English through calculation, but I find this PROOF unrealistically convincing to most of the people)

3. Capable of guessing unknown words.

One of the most intriguing benefits of learning etymology is that you can guess the meaning of a word even if you haven't seen the word before. Imagine you're taking the exam like TOEFL and GRE, you probably have no choice but to give up one question if the any keyword in the question is unknown to you. Now, if the word is subjected to analysis (70% chance). Bang! You're still in the game simply because you know these prefixes, roots and suffixes.

4. Enhance your speed of reading English.

Most of the people read from left to right. When you see a word progress, you process P-R-O-G-R-E-S-S one by one. If you memorize this word by etymology, you understand the word soon after you finish reading. That is, when you see the "pro", you have the "forward" meaning in your mind. When you see the "gress", you have the "step". Together, you get "forward step = step forward". Compared to methods of memorization, using etymology is most straightforward because the prefixes and roots MUST be in the word you read.

如何克服障礙

常見的困難點及相對應的解決之道.

Difficulties for beginners in the field of etymology are:

1. Spending extra time to memorize prefixes, roots and suffixes.

Before studying etymology, learners won't care about the meaning of "pro" since this is not even a word. Right now, learners have to worry about how to memorize the prefixes, roots and suffixes in conjunction with the already cumbersome new words.

Solution 1: Start from an easy word

Whenever I encounter a new prefix, root or suffix, I will pick a known word containing the new etymology part to start with. For example, to memorize the root "gress", I do have several choices to start with:"progress, regress and transgress." However, I will choose the one I know (in this case, "progress") to connect the meaning of "gress" to meaning of "progress". In this way, I gain the benefits of acquiring these prefixes, roots or suffixes with minimum effort.

In a nutshell,

1. Target a new etymology part: Let it be a prefix, a root or a suffix.

Ex: "gress" = walk

2. List out several words containing the target.

Ex: Progress, regress, transgress.

3. Choose the one that's most familiar to you

Ex: Progress

4. Connect the meaning of Progress to root "gress"

Progress= pro + gress = forward + walk

= 向前 + 走 = 向前走 = 進步

5. Pick up all the other words

Regress = Re + gress = back + walk

= 向後 + 走 = 向後走 = 退步

Transgress = Trans + gress = cross + walk = go beyond the boundary of

= 穿越 + 走 = 逾越

Comments: 仔細的看一下中文解釋,會發現其實在中文和英文是有很大的雷同的,只是英文是把所有字義塞在同一個字裡面,中文則是分開成兩三個字(characters).

進(pro)+步(gress)

退(re)+步(gress)

逾(cross)+越(gress)

Difficulty 2. Multiple variations of one prefixes, roots or suffixes.

After studying etymology for a while, you will find the inconvenient truth that "grad" has the same meaning of "gress". This is not the worst one. Groups like

fac, fec, fect, fic, fy,feit or leg, lect, lex, lig are the killers that scare the beginners away

Solution 2: All the variations sounds alike

When I was a newbie to etymology, the fact that "fac, fec, fect, fic, fy, feit" is actually one root get me confused and then I started to think about why there are so many variations of one root. My conclusion so far is: to make a word easy to pronounce.

Let me list several word with root fac/fect/fic

fac: fact, factory, factor.

fect: defect, effect.

fic: fictitious, efficacious.

See any clue here? The longer the word, the lighter the vowel . Vowel goes from

a --> e --> i --> o --> u as the words prolong. After all, it's impossible to pronounce a long word with many a's in it

簡單來說,同樣的字首字根,"聽"起來都差不多,只是輕重的問題而已,像是fac,fec,fic,只要把母音a, e, i, o, u看成一樣的

fac --> fxc (好像在罵髒話,XD)

fec --> fxc

fic --> fxc

就不難發現,他們其實真的都是表兄弟姊妹.要一起記憶也就不會那麼困難,那麼的突兀了.

學習的障礙

學習字首字根是要花時間的,而且有一定的困難度,底下我把一些一般常見的困難列出