As a reading specialist for middle and high schoolers, I know firsthand how literacy impacts our lives and breaks down barriers. I often stress how critical literacy is in our everyday lives to encourage students to read. Whether seeking employment, negotiating a contract, traveling on the roadways or knowing the proper medications to take, being able to read can’t be overlooked or downplayed. Simply put, having strong vocabulary and comprehension skills are critical to navigating life.
Personal health literacy is how individuals can find, understand and use information to make health-related decisions for themselves and others. Being health literate is being familiar with medical and anatomical terms, understanding statistics and understanding how a health issue may affect the body. Strong personal health literacy skills can help us prevent disease and better manage health problems as they arise.
Lack of health literacy stems from health information that is complicated and difficult to understand. Understanding health information is key to making informed decisions about our personal health. Doctors and medical institutions can help improve health literacy by using plain language and making the information more accessible. However, patients also can enhance their own health literacy by learning etymology and morphemic analysis.
Etymology is the study of the origin of words, while morphemic analysis is the process of identifying morphemes in a word. Morphemes are units of meaning, such as prefixes, roots and/or suffixes. And knowing their meanings helps us build our vocabulary. By learning one morpheme, we can unlock the meaning to several words. For example, the suffix -ectomy is the surgical removal of something in the body. Knowing this, we have a clue to the meaning iridectomy (removing part of the iris of the eye) and colectomy (removing part of the colon). If your doctor said you have gastroenteritis you could use morphemic analysis to understand you have inflammation (-itis) of the stomach (gastro, from the Greek gaster) and intestines (enter from the Latin intestinum).
Studying morphemes also helps readers improve their word decoding skills. Word decoding is the process of sounding out words and is key to improving our word reading and fluency (the ability to read quickly, accurately and with expression). When we are fluent readers, we can focus on comprehending the text. In my work with struggling readers at the middle and high school levels, most students have weak decoding and fluency skills. To improve literacy overall, educators should incorporate more morphemic analysis in their instruction. A great resource for teachers doing this work is my book, EtymologyRules: Back to Basics. This interactive learning resource teaches sounds, patterns and word parts, while increasing word recognition and vocabulary skills.
We can help people improve their health literacy skills in the following ways:
- Learn common Greek and Latin morphemes and practice identifying them in English words. Over 70 percent of English words come from Greek or Latin origins. By studying commonly used morphemes, you will recognize them in words you encounter. Break these words down into their morphemes and find the meaning of each one. Learning about morphemes can start as early as pre-school. Check out The EtymologyRules Show with Ms. B and Ori. This is a fun, educational program where kids explore word origins and build their vocabulary.
- Research the etymology of various medical terms. When you come across medical diagnoses and procedures, look up these words’ meanings and their etymology. Doing so helps you learn morphemes common in the medical field. Keep a list of morphemes to refer to as needed.
- Be an avid and wide reader. The more you read, the more words you are likely to encounter and understand, increasing our exposure to new vocabulary. Develop a daily reading habit and aim to read a variety of genres and topics.
- Chunk your reading of longer passages to check for understanding. Chunking a text is separating it into smaller, more manageable parts. After reading a couple of paragraphs, stop and check your understanding of the text. With younger children, you may need to break the text up for them. Ways to check for understanding include summarizing, paraphrasing and visualizing what you just read.
- Ask questions as you read. Rather than being a passive reader that zooms through the text, be an active reader by asking questions as you read. Asking questions helps you clarify misunderstandings and pushes you to approach the text with a critical lens.
Brittany Selah Lee-Bey is the author of “EtymologyRules: Back to Basics” and a reading specialist in Washington, D.C., who also promotes the need for effective literacy in underserved communities.