Nghiên cứu các bài tập học tích hợp về hình thái học và cú pháp tiếng Anh cho sinh viên năm thứ nhất tại Đại học Thái Nguyên

Morphology plays an important role in language learning.It focus on the understanding of language speakers to complex words and create new lexical items.Morphology knowledge about word a

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INTEGRATIVE LEARNING EXERCISES IN MORPHOLOGY AND

SYNTAX

A Dissertation Presented to the

Faculty of the Graduate School Batangas State University Batangas City

In Partial Fulfillment

of the Requirements for the Degree

Doctor of Philosophy Major in English

By:

DUONG THI HOA LU (Laura)

March 2015

Title : Integrative Learning Exercises in Morphology and Syntax

Author : Duong Thi Hoa Lu (Laura)

Course : Doctor of Philosophy

The study included the 400 first year college students and 70 teachers in Basic English Course in the Academic Year 2014-2015 in Thai Nguyen University This study tested the following hypothesis that there are no significant differences on the levels of morpho-syntactic competency

of students and the assessment of the English language teachers It made use of the descriptive method of research with survey questionnaire and teacher-made test as the main data gathering instruments The data gathered were statistically treated with the use of percentage, weighted mean, standard deviation, independent t-test

Findings of the study revealed that as regards levels of understanding of students in morphology particularly in meaning of root words result indicates that the students‟ level of understanding in this area

of morphology is average with a fair number of students‟ demonstrating a reasonable degree of competence In prefixes, affixes and suffixes results showed that the total rating obtained by the students on this area is 59.12 percent which indicates that the students‟ performance in this area is average and is at par with the performance in the meaning of the root words As for word derivation the total rating obtained by the students on this area 63.25 percent which falls under the average level of classification which indicates that the freshman students‟ have developed a certain level

of adeptness in word derivation

In word formation, the total rating obtained by students in this morphology skill component which is 52.85 percent with the verbal equivalent rating of average indicates that the slightly lower numerical value suggests that the students are finding some difficulties along this area In relation to compounding of words, findings revealed that the students‟ obtained a total rating of 61.15 percent with a verbal equivalent rating of average in this morphology skill component which indicates that the freshman students performed consistently and has developed skills in compounding

Relative to the levels of students‟ performance in the use of syntax particularly in phrases, the total rating obtained for this component area is 51.95 percent or verbally equivalent to average which means that while the students demonstrate a certain degree of proficiency in this syntax skill, there are areas under this component that students do not know or unfamiliar As for clauses, results showed that the total rating obtained by students is 47.30 percent or its equivalent of average which implies that the student performance on clauses are average but below the 50 percent cut-off value For sentences, the total rating students obtained is 60.50 percent

or average which implies that the students find the test easier and have demonstrated more advanced skill and competency in sentences as compared to phrases and clauses As regards functions the total rating of

the students‟ performance is 49.95 percent or average which implies that the students demonstrated some degree of proficiency on syntactic functions

In relation to comparison of the levels of understanding in morphology and performance in syntax, results show that in 22 out of 28 mean comparisons, the p-values are less than 0.05 which means that the morphology and syntax performances corresponding to this means are significantly different and are therefore not related In six out of 28 mean comparisons, the p-values were greater than 0.05 which means that the morphology and syntax performances corresponding to this means are not significantly different and so they are related to each other which means that in general, no relationship exist among these linguistic skills

With regards to teachers assessment of the morphological competencies and syntactic performance of students all the items obtained

an agree score of 100 percent which means that the teacher respondents unanimously agree that the items raised are valid items that can be used for the assessment of the students‟ morphological competencies and syntactic performances According to the frequency of use of students‟ skills, 11 out of 12 items had mean scores close to 3.0 or equivalent to sometimes and only one had mean scores close to 4.0 or equivalent to often which means that the teachers observed the students do not practice

and use these skills as often in the class For the assessment according to their degree of importance, result of assessment showed that all the 12 items had mean scores close to 4.0 or equivalent to moderately important which means that the teachers regarded the 12 items as only moderately important skills to be developed by the students as that there could be more important topic for teaching than those items

In terms of the difference on the levels of morpho-syntactic competencies of the students and their performance as assessed by English teachers, results showed that eight out of 11 component items had

a p-value that is below 0.05 which means that the teacher‟s assessment and students‟ morpho-syntactic competencies along these areas are significantly different which suggests that no relationship exist between the treatment means being compared Moreover, the integrative learning exercises on morpho-syntactic competencies designed are based on some criteria that are considered and used as concrete basis for the exercises to

be included to address the needs of the students

The study recommended that teachers may be encouraged to attend more trainings, seminars and workshops along the areas of morphology and syntax to further enhance their teaching techniques; that output must

be reviewed and evaluated, and similar studies be conducted by future researchers

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The author greatly acknowledges indebtedness to the following persons in their respective fields whose skills and competence contributed much to the completion of this study

Dr Dang Kim Vui, Prof Dr Dang Kim Vui, President of Thai

Nguyen University, for his continuous effort to make this Cooperation Program successful;

Dr.Matilda.H.Diamaano, her adviser for the whole hearted

assistance, her encouragement and precious time enthusiastically reading, editing the manuscript, for having provided the researcher useful materials Without her guidance and assistance, this dissertation would probably still

be incomplete;

Dr Nguyen The Hung, Director of the International Training Center

Thai Nguyen University, for his precious and whole hearted assistance and encouragement;

The Teachers and the student-respondents of the study, for their active involvement and cooperation; All friends who in one way or another have their encouragement and remarkable support;

Her affectionate parents and sibling, for innumerable blessings she had received through them, for being her greatest inspiration in pursuing this endeavor

D.T.H.L

DEDICATION

With pride and honor, this piece of work is lovingly dedicated

to her nice daughters and son,

to her loving husband and to her family

D.T.H.L

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

TITLE PAGE………

APPROVAL SHEET……… i

ABSTRACT………ii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT……….…vii

DEDICATION……… viii

TABLE OF CONTENTS……… ix

LIST OF TABLES……….x

LIST OF FIGURES……… xi

CHAPTER I THE PROBLEM 1

Introduction 1

Statement of the Problem 6

Scope, Delimitation and Limitation of the Study 8

II REVIEW OF LITERATURE 11

Research Literature 43

Synthesis 49

Theoretical Framework 51

Conceptual Framework 53

Hypothesis 55

Definition of Terms 55

III RESEARCH METHOD AND PROCEDURE 58

Research Environment 58

Research Design 61

Subjects of the Study 61

Data Gathering Instrument 63

Data Gathering Procedure 65

Statistical Treatment of Data 66

IV PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA 68

V SUMMARY OF FINDINGS……… … ….118

CONCLUSION RECOMMENDATION

BIBLIOGRAPHY…… ……… ………132

APPENDICES

A LETTER OF REQUESTS

B QUESTIONNAIRES

C DOCUMENTATIONS

LIST OF TABLES

Table Title Page

1 Distribution of Population and Sample 62

2 Level of Students‟ Understanding in Meaning of Root Words 69

3 Level of Understanding of Students in the Prefixes, Affixes and

Suffixes 71

4 Level of Understanding of Students in the Word Derivation 73

5 Level of Understanding of Students in the Word Formation 74

6 Level of Understanding of Students in the Compounding of

11 Relationships of the Student's Level of Morphological

Competencies and Performance in Syntax……… ……… 87

12 Students‟ skills employed in teaching the Basic English course…88

13 Student Skills and Their Frequency of Use 91

14 Students‟ Skills and Their Degree of Importance……… ….92

15 Difference of the Students‟ Level of Morpho-syntactic Competencies and their Performance as Assessed by English Teachers………93

16 Bases in the Design of Integrative Learning Exercises on

Morpho-syntactic Competencies 95

LIST OF FIGURE

Table Title Page

1 Research Paradigm……… ………54

CHAPTER I

THE PROBLEM Introduction

Nowadays English is considered as the international language of communication, especially in the area of commerce, trade, media, culture, arts and education.It is known as a key to open the door into the bustling word of rapid changes and development.Teaching and learning English in Vietnam has received special attention since the country implemented the

“open-door” policy.That is the reason why learning English is not only interesting but is also a great and practical demand for many people especially for those who want to advance in their careers and to achieve their long term study goals

English is a compulsory subject from the elementary school up to senior school in today‟s Vietnam education system.It is considered a difficult subject for the Vietnamese students because English is completely different from Vietnamese language being looked at from the system of structure, pronunciation and vocabulary.In the study of the English language, it involves the four language skills namely listening, speaking, reading and writing Aspects such as grammar, structure, vocabulary, spelling and pronunciation are the focus in English teaching and learning process For pedagogical reasons, specific skills may be focused on

separately but there are two elements that are important to the process of acquiring and using a language and that is grammar and vocabulary

The element of understanding of the English language consists of vocabulary items which makes it a very important segment in language teaching and learning aside from language structures and forms.So that grammatical and lexical aspects have a place in language teaching

According to Tikunoff (1983) students with limited English proficiency need these three kinds of competences which include participative competence which is the ability to respond appropriately to class demands and the procedural rules for accomplishing them; interactional competence, the ability to respond both to classroom rules of discourse and social rules of discourse, interacting appropriately with peers and adults while accomplishing class tasks; and academic competence, the ability to acquire new skills, assimilate new information, and construct new concepts

Syntax as one of the major components of grammar is the study of the rules that govern the ways in which words combine to form phrases, clauses and sentences It also refers to the arrangement of words in a sentence

Syntax is the grammar, structure or order of elements in a language statement It applies to natural languages

According to Crystal (2004), grammar is the structural foundation of a person‟s ability to express oneself The more one is aware as to how it works, the more the meaning and effectiveness of the way language is used can be monitored It can help foster precision, detect ambiguity, and exploit the richness of expression available in English It can help everyone, not only teachers of English, but teachers of anything, for all teaching is ultimately a matter of getting to grips of meaning

Further, for students to be functionally proficient in the classroom, they must to be able to utilize these competences to perform these three major functions such as to decode and understand both task expectations and new information, to engage appropriately in completing tasks, with high accuracy; and to obtain accurate feedback with relation to completing tasks accurately

In the study of English language, there are problems or difficulties encountered by students.Among the four skills, speaking is the most challenging as it involves a complex process of constructing meaning.The development of English learning on the other hand involves the use of real

or authentic material which reflect social and cultural context of language.Students therefore must have exposure to English resource material for them to improve their communicative skills.They can also engage in some activities like filling forms, writing letters or engage in

discussion as to the content of the reading material to enhance their comprehension.Failure of students to understand the language they hear leads to complete breakdown of communication so that students are challenged to make some attempts to understand language as native speaker does

Mastering the learning of language is crucial to most students.But there are methods, techniques and activities that would aid them to become proficient in the use of the language.Students who wish to learn English language must be able to make use of the four language components

Morphology plays an important role in language learning.It focus on the understanding of language speakers to complex words and create new lexical items.Morphology knowledge about word as the smallest element that may be uttered in isolation and pragmatic content as well as morpheme which is the smallest unit of meaning and the composition of word which include single morpheme is very important to students who are learning the language

In morphology, students encountered difficulty in forming compound word where they are going to add affixes to the root.Similarly, they can‟t put together words in order to build larger elements of language such as phrases, clauses and sentences.Further, there are also difficulties in

developing definition giving of synonyms of antonyms of certain words.So language teachers must look for a way to help students improve their language proficiency like utilizing instruction material fitted for the lesson that would make conversation of students prior knowledge to the new words so that students can make modifications of their existing framework

of knowledge and whenever they meet these words in their readings they effectively construct meaning

Language teachers must also give emphasis in the context of the words.They can discuss the meaning through context clues from the reading selection or by defining the terms to give clarity to meaning for better understanding of students.Further, students must also be given requested exposure in the use of words in different situations and meanings and engage them in oral and written practice

As in the case of inflections and word formation, students has encountered problems relative to determining the correct syntax in sentences and what kind of inflection the word need in order to have a grammatically correct statement.In this situation, language teacher must give emphasis to the teaching of word order and give focus on the functions and relationship of each word for students to develop their language proficiency Producing appropriate grammatical utterance is not the only measure that students develop language proficiency but instead

they must have the ability to produce and understand those utterances in a particular grammar sequence that is most appropriate to the linguistic and situational context

Further, students must develop their ability to apply grammatical rules of language in order for them to grammatically correct sentences and where and who to use these sentences and for whom.This indicates that in all aspects in the study of language, they must learn the appropriateness of its uses, communication with other people and culture as well as in linguistic and situational context

As an English language teacher teaching General English in Thai Nguyen University, difficulties in morphology along the areas of word formation, affixes, synonyms and antonyms as well as compounding and word functions were observed among freshman college students This scenario, prompted the researcher to conduct a study along morpho-syntactic competency of firstyear college students with integrative language exercise as output to enhance students‟ morpho-syntactic competence

Statement of the Problem

This study aimed to determine the morphological competencies and performance in syntactic of first year college students in English Language

at Thai Nguyen University

Specifically, the study sought answers to the following questions;

1 What is the level of understanding of students in the following morphological competencies:

1.1 meaning of root words, 1.2 prefixes, affixes and suffixes, 1.3 word derivation,

1.4 word formation, and 1.5 compounding of words?

2 What is the level of students‟ performance in the use of syntax relative to:

2.1 phrases, 2.2 Clauses, 2.3 sentences, and 2.4 functions?

3 How do levels of understanding morphological competencies and performance in syntax compare? Are there significant relationships?

4 How do English language teachers assess morphological competencies and syntactic performance of students?

5 Is there any significant difference on the levels of morphological and syntactic competencies of the students and their performance as assessed by English teachers?

6 What integrative learning exercises in morphology and syntax

may be proposed?

Scope, Delimitation and Limitation of the Study

The study covers the level of morphological and syntactic competencies of first year college students in English language at Thai Nguyen University This included the level of morphological competency of student respondents in terms of meaning of root words, affixes, pre-fixes, suffixes, word derivation, word formation and compounding of words.Part also of this study is the level of syntactic competency of student respondents relative to phrases, clauses, sentences and functions.This also covers the assessment of the teachers on the students‟ morphological and syntactic competencies, the significant difference on the level of this competency with the end view of proposing an integrative language exercise to enhance the students‟ morphological and syntactic competency

The study covered the 400 first year college students and their 70 teachers in Basic English Course in the Academic Year 2014-2015 in Thai Nguyen University Students who are in their second year, third year and fourth year respectively are not part of the study Likewise, results of the study are limited only on the data gathered from the respondents

Significance of the Study

This study is believed to have profound significance to the Administrators, Faculty of Foreign Language, First Year Students in Thai Nguyen University, and future researchers

Administrators.Findings of this study will provide basic information

to the administrators regarding levels of morphological and syntactic competencies of first year college students and these will also serve as an opener for them to have plans of providing effective Faculty Development Training Program gearing towards improving students‟ English language proficiency

Faculty of Foreign Language Results of the study will provide

them information on the current status regarding morphological and syntactic competencies of first year college students in English language for them to have an opportunity to choose the best training program to attend toin order to improve their strategies in teaching morphology and syntax

First Year Students of TNU.This study will serve as input for them

to be aware on their morphological and syntactic competencies They will

be informed of their weaknesses so that they can make some ways to improve their English performance

Present Researcher Results of this study may contribute to

broaden his knowledge in providing recommendations to improve morphological and syntactic competencies of first year college students

Future Researchers Results of the study will be of use to other researchers who wish to conduct a similar study.Future researchers may use this study to enrich their own body of literature and substantiate their own findings

CHAPTER II

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

This chapter presents the review of concepts and studies that fits

into the existing body of knowledge.These literatures provide a rich background and right direction to complete the present study Included also

in this chapter are synthesis, theoretical and conceptual frameworks, paradigm of the study and definition of terms

Conceptual Literature

The following concepts branches of linguistics, morphology,English syntax and English language learning exercises which were discussed provided a conceptual frame of reference in the study

Branches of Linguistics.The scientific study of human language

and speech is termed Linguistics It is the study of language and is concerned with human language as a universal part of human behavior and of the human abilities (Nasr, 1984) Linguistics as competence is referred to as being a person‟s potential to speak a language, and his or her linguistics performance as the realization of that potential (Powers, et al., (1994) The following are the branches of linguistics and these include: phonetics as the study of the sounds of human language; phonology or phonemics as the study of patterns of a language‟s basic sounds; morphology as the study of the internal structure of words; syntax as the study

of how words combine to form grammatical sentences; semantics as the study

of the meaning of the words or lexical semantics and fixed word combinations

or phraseology and how these combine to form the meanings of sentences; pragmatics as the study of how utterances are used such as literally or figuratively in communicative acts; discourse analysis as the study of sentences organized into texts; and applied linguistics, the application of the methods and results of linguistics to such areas as language teaching, national language policies, translation, language politics, advertising, classroom and courts or forensic linguistics (http://www Stiba-malang.com/ uploadbank/ pustaka/MKLINGUISTIK/BRANCH %20OF%20LINGUISTICS.pdf.)

Included also under the branches of linguistics are lexicography, the compiling of dictionaries, sociolinguistics, the study of language in relation

to social factors such as social class, educational level, age, sex and ethnic origin as well as the study of language choice in bilingual or multilingual communities, language planning or language attitudes; stylistics, the study

of that variation in language which is dependent on the situation in which the language is used and also on the effect the writer or speaker wishes to create on the reader or hearer and triesto establish principles capable of explaining the particular choices made by individuals and social groups in their use of language; literary stylistics, the analysis of literary textsapplying linguistic methods and theories with the aim of providing retrievable

interpretations which allow comparisons of different texts and genres, and psycholinguistics, the study of the mental processes underlying the planning, production, perception, and comprehension of speech (http://www.vodppl.upm.edu.my/uploads/docs/INTRODUCTION%

20AND%20LINGUISTICS%20-LECTURE%203.ppt.)

Phonetics, as a branch of linguistics is the study of speech sound

To describe speech sounds, it is necessary to know what an individual is, and how each sound differs from all others (Fromkin, et al., 2010) As the study of the actual physical properties of sounds or phones, as well as non-speech sounds, their production, audition, and perception of human language, phonetics deals with the sounds themselves rather than the contexts in which they are used in languages ( http://hadirukiyah.blogspot com/2009/07/definition-and-branches-of-linguistics.html)

Whereas the description of the linguistic knowledge that linguists try

to produce as well as the linguistic knowledge that speakers have about the sound patterns of their language are referred to as phonology Studying which sounds are distinctive units within a language is considered an important part of phonology

Morphology on the other hand is the study of word formation or word structure According to Parker (1986) morphology is the study of the architecture of words.It is generally accepted that while words are

considered the smallest units of syntax, by means of rules words can relate

to other words in most languages There are specific patterns or regularities in which words are formed from smaller units and how these units interact in speech depending on how the speaker comprehended the rules Such patterns of word- formation across and within languages, as well as explication attempts on formal rules reflective of the knowledge of the speakers of languages are dealt with in morphology

In addition, syntax as one of the branches of linguistics refers to the part of grammar that represents a speaker‟s knowledge of sentences and their structures It deals with the study of the rules that govern the ways in which words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences It is one of the major components of grammar (http:// grammar about com/ od/ rs /q/ syntax.htm) Semantics is the most fundamental concepts in linguistics, as

it refers to the study of meaning which in turn is essential to the study of language acquisition in terms of how language users acquire a sense of meaning as speakers and writers, listeners and readers as well as of language change It is considered important in understanding language in social contexts as these are likely to affect meaning and understanding language varieties of English and effects of style In studying semantics, it includes the study of how the meaning is constructed, interpreted, clarified,

obscured, illustrated, simplified, negotiated, contradicted and paraphrased ( www.Teachit.co.uk./armoore/language/semantics.htm/)

Moreover, pragmatics refers to the study of how literal and non- literal aspects of communicated linguistic meaning are determined by principles that refer to the physical or social context in which language is used Conversational, conventional implicatures as well as metaphor, other tropes and speech acts are the aspects of pragmatics (http://www Merriam- webster.com/dictionary/pragmatics) Pragmatists as explained by Finch (2000) focus on what is not explicitly stated and how utterances are interpreted in situational contexts as they concerned not so much with the sense of what is said as with its force, that is, with what is communicated

by the manner and style of an utterance

Discourse analysis according to Abrams, et al., (2005) is the study

of ways in which language is used in texts and contexts It is a modern discipline that covers a wide variety of different sociolinguistic approaches

It aims to analyze the use of discourse in language beyond the level of a sentence; language behaviors linked to social practices; and language as a system of thought (https://sites.google.com/sheffield.ac.uk//all-about-linguistic /branches/discourse –analysis/what-is-discourse-analysis)

Lexicography on the other hand pertains to the art of making dictionary (Mugglestone, 2011) There are two important groups of

lexicography These include practical lexicography which is the process of writing, editing, and or compiling a dictionary and theoretical lexicography which is a scholarly discipline of analyzing and describing the semantic, syntagmatic or paradigmatic relationships within the lexicon or vocabulary

of a language, develop theories of dictionary components and structures, linking the data in dictionaries, the needs for information by users in specific types of situation and how users may best access the data incorporated, imprinted and electronic dictionaries referred to as meta-lexicography (grammar about com/od /il /g/lexicogterm.htm./)

The study of how language serves and shaped by the social nature

of human beings pertains to sociolinguistics.As a branch of linguistics, it analyzes the many and diverse ways in which languages and society entwine It examines the interplay of language and society, with language

as the starting point The basic premise of sociolinguistics is that language

is variable and changing (http://pbs.org/speak/speech/sociolinguistics/) Stylistics on the other hand, as a branch of linguistics, is the study of the devices in language such as rhetorical figures and syntactic patterns that are considered to produce expressive literary style (www Britanica.am/ EB.checked/topic/570324/stylistics)

According to Barry (2002) stylistics is the modern version of the ancient discipline known as rhetoric which taught its students how to

structure an argument, how to make effective use of figures of speech, and generally how to pattern and vary a speech or a piece of writing so as to produce the maximum impact Stylistic analysis attempts to provide a commentary which is objective and scientific, based on concrete and quantifiable data and applied in systematic way Clark, et al., (1997) pointed out that the field of psycholinguistics is concerned with discovering the psychological process that make it possible for humans to acquire and use language It addresses three major concerns namely; how people understand spoken and written language; how people produce language or speech production; and how language is acquired

Morphology.The term referred to as the combination of morphemes

into words It is the study of word formation processes and morphemic structure of words (Napoli, 1996) The term morphology examines how words are structured internally.It also looks at the way words are formed

(blog.innovative/lang.com/2009/linguistic morphology)

Morphology is the study of the internal structure and formation of words in languages that deals with inflection, derivation and compounding, the system of word-forming elements and processes in a language (Baver,L.2003/ books.google.com.vn /books/ introducing linguistic) In most languages rules determine the close relationship of words and students who have mastered the language to some degree due to his knowledge in

morphology can analyze and identify words in the second language Further, students must clearly understand the terms of precise patterns in which the word is formed in a sentence or phrase

Knowledge in morphology includes knowledge of individual morphemes, their pronunciation, their meaning, and their knowledge of the rules for combining morphemes into complex words According to Delahunty, et al, (1994) morphemes are said to be the most elemental units of meaning in a language It is the smallest meaningful part of the word Morphemes that are attached are said to be bound and affixes are classified according to whether they are attached before or after the form to which they are added

Morphology is the study of how words are put together It is developed as a subfield of linguistics as soon as linguist realized that the rules they had devised to explain the sound patterns in English could explain the structure of words (http.www.guiglet.com) It pertains also to the scientific study of forms and structure of words in language as well as the mental system involved in word formation or to the branch of linguistics that deals with words, their internal structure and how they are formed (http.www.blackwell,publishing.com)

In addition, according to Booji, (2007) morphology as a discipline of linguistics, refers to the study of the forms of words It also refers to the identification, analysis and description of structure of a given

sub-language‟s morphemes and other linguistic units such as root words, affixes, parts of speech, intonation stress or implied context (www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic)

Hamaward (2011) stated that morphology has the following aims:to describe the structures of words and patterns of word formation in a language; to pin down the principles for relating the form and meaning of morphological expression; explain how the morphological units are integrated and the resulting formation interpreted; and show how morphological units are organized in the lexicon in terms of affinity and contrast.The lexical resources of language is uncovered by the study of morphology that help speakers to acquire the skills and use them creatively and consequently to express with eloquence their thoughts and feelings

Morphology has two branches and these include the lexical or derivational which studies the way in which new items of vocabulary can be built up out of the combination of elements and inflectional morphology which studies the ways words vary in their form in order to express a grammatical contrast (Crystal, 2003) Inflectional forms of various lexemes,

as well as the character of an appendix to the syntax which is a major component of grammar are also covered under inflectional morphology whereas lexical-word formation is related to the dictionary by contrast

Huddleston et al., (2002) describe lexical word formation as the process by which new lexical bases composed of more than one morphological element.Word formation is the traditional term for lexical word formation There are two kinds of morphological word formation namely:derivation which involves affixing bound forms to existing lexemes whereby the addition of the affix derives a new lexeme and compounding which is a process of word formation that involves combining complete word forms into a single form

In morphology, words are the smallest independent units of language which means they can be separated from other units and can change position Words are the only units of language and the smallest units of language which are independent, can be separated from one another and can move around in sentence Words have internal structure being the smallest independent units of language and built by simple words which comprise of one piece that do not have internal structure.Complex words on the other hand have internal structure and consist of two or more pieces

O „Grady (1997) stated that these pieces are called morphemes and are the smallest bearing units of language Morphology which refers to the rules of combining morphemes has three approaches The three primary approaches of morphology are the item and arrangement approach or

morpheme; the item and process approach or the lexeme and the word and paradigm approach or the word based.Based on the morphology model, a student must be familiar with the spelling of the word, the pronunciation and definition of the word, the parts of speech of the word, the history of the word, if the word is improper; if the word is out of date; examples of the word, any slang associated with the word; and the root of the word for him to possess the knowledge of a word

Further, in English language morphology which is the study of word forms is concerned with the use of morphemes to form words as well as the linguistic investigation of the combination of morphemes Lyons (1974) pointed out features of morphemes which include the minimal units of grammatical analysis and language, the units of lowest rank out of which words the units of next higher rank are composed In morpheme based morphology, analysis of word forms as arrangement of morpheme is done.There are three basic axioms in morpheme-based-morphology These are single morpheme hypothesis by Baudoin; sign based morpheme hypothesis by Bloomfield and lexical morpheme hypothesis also by Bloomfield.In single morpheme hypothesis, roots and affixes have the same status as morpheme while in sign based morpheme, the morphemes are dualistic signs because they have both forms and meanings.As for

lexical morpheme hypothesis, the morpheme, affixes and roots alike are stored in the lexicon

In the case of lexeme-based morphology, it is an item and a process approach It assumes that only lexemes, derived or underived, are signs and that affixes, reduplication, revowelling, metathesis, subtraction, stem mutation, and the like, are means of phonologically marking independent derivational operations which a lexeme might have undergone (Aronoff, 1994) A word form is said to be the result of the rules applied that changes

a word form or stem to produce a new one instead of analyzing the said form as a set of morphemes arranged in sequence

A stem is taken by an inflectional rule and as a requirement of the rule changes it and a word form is outputted.As for derivational rule, a stem

is taken and based on its own requirement it changes.In compounding rule,

it takes a word form and a compound stem is similarly outputted

Word-based-morphology on the other hand is also a word and paradigm approach A paradigm which serves as the central concept is considered in this theory.Word-based morphology states generalizations that hold between the forms of inflectional paradigm instead of stating the rules to combine morphemes into word forms or to generate word forms from stems It is a hypothesis which states that all regular word formation processes are word based A new-word is formed by applying a regular

rule to single already existing word Both the new word and the existing one are members of major lexical categories (Aronoff, 1976)

In addition, morpheme as the smallest in the grammatical rank scale, Yule (1985) explained that is a minimal linguistic element with a unit of meaning or grammatical function.A morpheme cannot be further divided into smaller grammatical or meaningful components but it can function as any of the following elements in the structure of words such as base, prefix, infix, suffix and ending.The exponent of a morpheme relating to the morpheme as an abstraction with morpheme itself being its realization is called a morph (www.unilorin.edu.ng/publication)

Allomorph on the other hand is a family of morpheme, deriving from the fact that in English, certain morphemes or morphs change their nature from one word environment to the other Allomorphs relate to the phonological aspect of grammatical analysis (Eka, 1994).There are two major types of morphemes:free and bound A word is the free morpheme also known as the root.It is independent in terms of meaning and forms and it can stand on its own.A bound morpheme on the other hand cannot stand on its own as it is subordinate to the free morpheme.Bound morphemes are the affixes which are bound morphemes, affixed to the beginning of words, and infixes are those inserted in the middle of the words, while suffixes are bound morphemes that are added at the word endings

Fromkin, et al, (1973) explained that there are two kinds of bound morphemes.These are inflectional and derivational morphemes or inflectional or derivational affixes.Affixes that change word classes as new word classes or parts of speech audience or developed through them are called derivational morphemes.Identified other types of morphemes include:full and empty morphemes, additive, replacive and zero morphemes.Elements that are later identified as content words are called full morphemes while empty morphemes are those that will be identified as grammatical words.Affixes added to the free morphemes are referred to as additive morphemes while morpheme that replaced other morphemes pertains to replacive morphemes and those morphemes that are unseen are called zero morphemes

There are major processes identified by which words are formed according to Quirck et al (1972).One is affixation which is the process by which bound morphemes are added within or after the root or free morphemes It is the process of word formation by prefixation, infixation and suffixation; the lexical and grammatical information is added to the sense of the root through this process.Prefixes change the meaning of the roots without altering their grammatical statuses.Infixes and suffixes mostly

do not change the meaning of the roots or the base forms but give information about number, gender and tense so they also change the

grammatical classes of the base forms As affix can be made up of a letter, two or seven letter infixes also referred to as replacive morphemes as they tend to replace other morphemes and letters in the root form.They are mostly inflectional as they give grammatically such as number, tense, case, suffixes Suffixes are classified into two types depending in their functions.These are noun class, verb class, adjective class and adverb class suffixes.Noun class suffixes convert the base form to a noun.Adjective class suffixes connect the base form to adjective while verb class suffixes change the root form to verbs.Adverb class suffixes change the root form to adverb

Another is compounding which involves the combination of two or more words.The combine forms can be with a hyphen or without it.The three identified types of compounds are: solid, hyphenated or two word forms Langaker (1968) explained that compound is a lexical unit consisting of two or more full morphemes To know what type is applicable

or if it is correct in a given context, a student needs to consult current dictionaries of English compounds to identify whether it may be nouns, adjectives, adverbs or verbs

Reduplication which is a process of repetition of words is a form of compounding.It can either be partial or total.In partial reduplication, the two forms are slightly different from each other as only a letter or two

changes.The same forms are repeated in total reduplication Conversion is another type of process for word formation.It is the process of forming a new word from an existing word merely by changing the grammatical class

of the latter word.Conversion may or may not involve the change of the stress patterns.The same word assumes different class in conversion

Moreover, two words are brought together to form a new word in blending According to Habana, et al., (1988) blends or two or more words blended to make new words It is a process that involves collapsing one form into the other In forming blends, either affixes or syllables of the words are removed to make the two words agreeable.Two words are brought together to form a new word in blending.It is a process that involves collapsing one form into the other.In forming blends, either affixes

or syllables of the words are removed to make the two words agreeable

For clipping it is a morphological process of word shortening to the effect that words retain their original meanings Marchland, (1969) defines clipping as a word formation process which consists in the reduction of a word to one of its parts and is also known as truncation Clipping is done essentially by removing initial and or final syllables Clipping arises from the innate tendency to economize words.Clips are mostly used in informal contexts