The Word Roots series teaches vocabulary based on Latin and Greek roots in a manner somewhat similar to Vocabulary from Classical Roots from EPS/School Specialty. This series has five levels: Beginning and Level 1 through Level 4.
These courses allow students to work independently, and each book includes a pre-test, post-test, and answer key along with the lessons.
The Beginning level for grades 3 and 4 introduces six new words in each week’s lesson, except three weeks that are dedicated to review. Each lesson has four activities. In the first activity, students identify roots, prefixes, and suffixes, and then match up each word with its correct definition. In the next two activities, students select the correct word to complete a sentence. The fourth activity requires students to write their own sentences using each of the new words.
Levels 1 and 2, usable for grades five through twelve, have four activities per week plus an optional creative writing activity. Review lessons are after every two weeks. Each of the regular lessons introduces ten new vocabulary words and about ten word parts—prefixes, roots, and suffixes. The four activities in the regular lesson are matching words with their definitions, selecting one of three words to fill in the blank with the word used in context, writing definitions of words (choosing from definitions supplied in a box), and writing complete sentences for each word to show the meaning of the word by the context of the sentence. Each activity is on a separate page.
Review lessons also have four parts: matching word parts to their definitions, matching words and definitions, unscrambling vocabulary words to write the correct word with each definition, and selecting the correct word (from three options) to complete a sentence. Since students work with twice as many words in review lesson activities, they are not required to write complete sentences for all the words.
Levels 3 and 4 for grades seven through twelve have the same lesson parts as the other levels, but they have six or seven vocabulary words and about ten word parts per lesson. Review lessons follow every three lessons.
For both lessons and reviews, students work with the same definitions and word parts repeatedly. Constructing their own sentences is the most challenging activity in terms of critical thinking. The unscrambling activity in the reviews will probably be challenging—maybe frustratingly so for some students, but students can flip back to previous lessons to figure out what word they are looking for, then look for an assemblage of letters that makes that word.
While Level 1 teaches words based entirely upon Latin, all other levels teach word parts and words from both Latin and Greek and, occasionally, from Old English. Levels 1 through 4 have glossaries with definitions of word parts. However, one important feature is missing from the glossaries and the lessons—identification of which language is the source for each word part or word. While this information isn't needed to complete the lessons, I think it would be helpful.
You can view sample pages on the publisher’s website.
