English Language Training for New Bachelor's Students 2023/2024

Building Vocabulary: Multiple Meanings and Suffixes

This tutorial explains how to make sure you start with the correct definition of a new word you just learned.

So, if the same word can have different meanings depending on how it is used, it also becomes important that we know and understand more than one meaning for the same word. This will help improve our vocabulary, comprehension, and writing.

This tutorial explains how to figure out the multiple meanings of a word and choose the definition that works for a specific situation.

                                                                         

 

Working with New Words

Let's imagine that you just learned the word "reconcile". You opened the dictionary, and you see that "reconcile" has several meanings. It's a very handy word! Let's see how we can use the dictionary to remember and start using this word.

1. Meaning #1

   to agree or become friendly again after a disagreement
   
   Example:  Sara hoped she would be able to reconcile with her sister after years of not speaking to her.
   
   

2. Meaning #2

   to make sure the numbers or facts in two documents match
   
   Example: It is a good idea to reconcile your checkbook with your bank statement to make sure your total is the same in both documents.
   
   

3. Meaning #3

   to accept a fact or idea
   
   Example: I am reconciled to the fact that I need to work hard to get my college degree.
   
   

4. Word Families

   "Reconcile" is also part of a family of words. As we learned, suffixes - that is groups of letters added at the end of a word - can change the part of speech of a word. So, if we use the suffix "-tion," we can change "reconcile from a verb to a noun: "reconciliation". As a noun, reconciliation means the act of reconciling.
   

Common Noun Suffixes

Common Verb Suffixes

Common Adjective Suffixes

Note about using suffixes

Suffixes are great for building our vocabulary and guessing the meaning sometimes, too. However, we must be careful when using them. Unfortunately, you can't just put together any noun and the suffix -al to make an adjective fit in your sentence ("tigeral" (tiger+al) isn't a word!). Also, it doesn't mean that all words that end in -al are adjectives (approval, for example).

So be careful – sometimes it's impossible to add or change the suffix. For example, I can't put -al on "action" to make the adjective "actional" – it's just not a word used in English. Please check a dictionary if you are unsure.

Now that we remember how to use a dictionary and suffixes to improve vocabulary, let's put this knowledge into practice.