Hello Subscribers, Welcome Let’s Talk Spoken English Institute in Mumbai. Now you have access to another great free Spoken English lesson from our Spoken English course. Today’s English lesson is about Vocabulary, yes you heard it right, Vocabulary. If someone asks me a question – How to speak fluent English? The answer is to expand your vocabulary. This free English lesson teaches you, how you could learn new vocabulary in the quickest possible time. Learn how words are rooted and form new words, learn about prefix and suffix to form new words. I hope you find this lesson useful and make a good difference to your English learning journey.
Complete Lesson Transcript:
Hello and welcome to my new lesson, my name is Emmelda and this lesson will be useful to all those who are trying to learn English. You are probably at the beginner’s stage or at the intermediate stage, wanna know how? We will be talking about vocabulary. Now you see, English has four and a half million words, that’s correct. Each year approximately 25,000 words are added to your dictionary. It’s practically impossible to learn all the words and their meanings. so today’s lesson is all about trying to break the words and see or gain some clues out of those words, right? How are we going to do it? It’s very simple, every time you break the word, the word will give you clues. Let’s break a word, how about duration? Duration, the word dur has to do something with time. So during or duration has to do something with time. Alright, that’s what we have for today. So let’s break the word. When you break the word, the first thing you see is a prefix. Prefix is that portion of the word that comes at the beginning of the word. So let’s say if your word is like this, this portion will be your prefix. Let’s take a look at a few examples. The first example, I have is pre. Pre as I said, it’s the beginning or it happens early. So anytime I’m sorry rather most of the time if you see a word that has pre, you automatically get the hint, it has to do something with early, for example, prepone. What is prepone? You plan to do something ahead of its scheduled time that is you bring forward or bring ahead certain actions. You prepone your meeting, you prepone your assignment date. Prepone, predate. Predate means it is dated ahead of the regular time. It could be last year or it could be last century. So pre actually has to do with early. So next time, if you see a word with pre at the beginning, understand that word may mean early or has something to do with early. Moving on to another prefix, we have auto. Auto means self or independent. You noticed some word or you remember the word? Automatic, a lot of people use gadgets which are automatic. How about your washing machine? Or your microwave? They automatically cook the food for you or the washing machine washes the clothes for you. Your car is an automobile. You don’t have to pedal it but you just turn on the engine and it starts running automatically.
I have for you is, ex. ex means out of. You will see the word, ex in words such as exit or exception. Both means out of. Exit means out of a room or a chamber or a building. Exception means out of the norm for example, a penguin is an exception because it’s a bird that cannot fly.
The next I have for you is, mis. now mis means wrong so if you hear or read certain words which have mis at the beginning, you automatically know, it has something to do with wrong or an error. For example, a mistake. It is something that you did not desire for. It’s a mistake or a misfortune, where perhaps yu may have lost your money in a casino or you met with an accident. It’s a misfortune. Similar to mis, we have mal. Mal means ill or error now you will use mal in words such as malfunction. Your laptop is malfunctioning that means your laptop is showing an error. Or if you don’t take food properly, you become malnourished. You become ill, so mal, malfortune, malnutrition. Mal and mis are very similar but you cannot interchange them. You cannot say, misfucntion, no. it will still be called, malfunction. Here, practise is essential because you need to practise a lot to understand where you have mis and where you have mal.
So now we see how prefixes give you the clues of what the word could mean, right? Got it?
Moving on to the root. It’s not possible that all the words, the prefix will give you the meaning. So the next thing you may wanna do is, find out the root word. Certain words will have a root word and some additional words. The root word will tell you the meaning, for example, fort, fort means strength. What kind of words, will have fort? Effort, effort means you have the strength, you do something with your own strength. So you take effort or you make effort.
The next I have for you is fortitude. Fortitude means strength of mind. It means your endurance, right? So anytime you see fort, understand the word is actually talking about strength, got it? Right?
Let’s see another example, script, script means write. It’s a written form. So the moment you see, script or scribe, you know it has something to do with writing. For example, the transcription which is running through. Transcription is the written version of the audio file or the video you’re listening to. You have a manuscript. Manuscript is a written version of the story or an action that’s happening. So script means write. It can come in words such as transcript, manuscript, encryption, alright, got it? Sure can we go on to another word? Great.
The next word I have is photo. Now photo actually means light. You see how the camera captures different lights and it will give you into a picture. A photograph means a diagram of light. Yeah, that’s cool, isn’t it? Yes so photograph means a diagram of light. Photo means light.
The next word that we use quite commonly is, a photocopy that means it captures the same light that the original photo or the picture or the paper has. So it’s a photocopy, copying the light. Another word I have for you is, photosynthesis. Now photosynthesis is a process where the plant captures the light of the sun and uses it to produce leaves, fruit and vegetables. So photo actually means light. So you see friends, a root word can tell you what the word can actually mean. Okay we have fort, we have script, we have photo.
Moving on to, the end of the word. Again you may not be able to find the meaning using a prefix. You may not understand what the root word is.so sometimes try to see the end or the ending of the word. We have what we call as, suffix. The suffix is that part of the word that comes at the end. Let’s see a few suffixes. The first one I have is,al. al means related to. Now when I say related to, let’s take an example, the first example I have is historical. Okay, here history is the base word but you have al that means it is related to history. So let’s say, you want to say, this book is historical because you may have found that book sometime in history and trying to read through, you’re trying to understand what may have happened in history or in the past. So historical, rehearsal. Rehearse means to practice. So when you say, I’m going to rehearsal that means it has something related to your practice or the word rehearse. So al means rehearsal. Or al means related to, an example is historical, rehearsal, rhetorical, parental, something related to your parents, emotional something related to the emotion. Right, so it’s historical, rehearsal, rhetorical, emotional, parental. So the next time of you see, al, you know it has something related to the base word.
Okay, the next suffix I have for you is, ful, ful means full of. You will use this ful specially with emotions. For example, awful that means I’m full of awe, I’m full of regret or I’m shameful, I’m shameful, I’m regretful of whatever happened to me or however, I behaved. Or if I’m in a better mood, I’ll be grateful. Probably, I’m thankful to my boyfriend, my partner, my father, my sister, my mother for whatever they have done for me. So I am thankful, I am full of gratitude. I am full of thanks that I have for them. Now ful usually comes with an emotion, okay. So that’s ful. Moving on to the last suffix, I have for you is, on. On means at or process. So anytime you see a word that ends with on. For example, action. The action is a process of acting, moving. So on, process, on is a process, the action is a process of acting. How about rejection? You know you may face rejection that means, you are facing the process of being rejected. So you have rejection. The last I have for you is, administration. Now to administer means you oversee things, you supervise things but let’s say, if you are the person who is doing it, how do you do it? It’s an administration. The act of overseeing things the act of supervising things. The act of making things perfect or checking on what is happening is administration.
So these are the three suffixes I have for you that will help you tell what the word could actually mean. I hope I have given you some great formulas, some great tricks to understand the meaning of the word using your prefix, your roots or your suffix, you will be able to expand your vocabulary and learn what the word could actually mean. I will be coming back with a new lesson, until then stay tuned, have fun learning English and stay beautiful, see you, have a wonderful time.