Vocabulary for TOEFL iBT

46 VOCABULARY FOR TOEFL iBT

is called etymology. When you break down a word and identify a root word from

another language, you are tracing the etymology or history of that word.

DEFINITION

etymology: the history of a word, the study of its origin and development

Many words have a rich history, and a detailed etymological study will show you

not only where a word comes from but also how its meaning has changed over time.

For now, however, the focus of this chapter remains on learning some of the most

common roots so that you can better determine meaning and succeed on the

TOEFL iBT.

HERE’S A HINT

MNEMONICS

Don’t let the spelling of this word scare you! Mnemonics is a simple concept.

Meaning “memory aid,” mnemonics can be handy for helping you remember a

word’s root word, meaning, or spelling. The idea behind mnemonics is that peo-

ple remember best when more than one function of the brain is used to process

information.

Simple mnemonics can be created from rhymes, tunes, or acronyms (words that

are made up of the first letters of a group of words or phrases. For example, the

acronym Roy G. Bivis a mnemonic used when learning the colors of the spectrum

(red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet). Mental pictures and stories are also

useful mnemonics.

Use mnemonic devices to remember the meaning of word roots. For example,

you can use the following sentences to remember these roots:

Root Meaning Sentence

nomen name My name is Nom.

herb plants My mother plants herbsin her garden.

graph write He will write the information on a graph.

pan all All the eggs are in the pan.

phil love Philloves to help others.

Here’s a trick to remember the difference between hetero(different) and homo

(same): homohas the same number of letters as same.

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