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- Okay.
So I just modeled some talking to the text for you
of the first part of your black history month article.
And we encountered this word, disenfranchisement,
that we're going to look at a little more closely now
and talk about ways to maybe figure out
what it means using clues from the text and word parts.
So we're going to write the word on our metacognitive reading log
right here under "unfamiliar words in the text."
And the first thing we'll do is divide the word into syllables
to help us make sure we're pronouncing it correctly
and look at how the word breaks up into smaller parts
to help us figure out the meaning.
So it's dis - en - fran - chise - ment.
So it has five syllables,
and it starts with this first syllable which is "dis"
which is what's called a prefix
which is a syllable that comes at the beginning of a word
that can impact the meaning.
And so the prefix "dis" can help us kind of understand
the meaning of this word.
And the prefix "dis" should be familiar to us,
because we have heard plenty of other words
that start with the prefix "dis,"
like discomfort or disagree or dishonest, right?
So that kind of gives us a clue of what the pronoun,
I mean, the prefix "dis" would mean.
It means "not," right?
Discomfort is something that is not comfortable.
If you experience discomfort, you're not comfortable,
or someone who's dishonest, they're not honest.
So this prefix "dis" means "not,"
so that gives us a clue of what the word might mean.
It's not enfranchisement.
Okay. And then i want to go to the end of the word.
The last syllable is "ment" which is a suffix.
And I bet you can guess
that a suffix comes at the end of a word,
the syllable at the end of a word
that can, again, impact or change the meaning.
So "ment" is a suffix that should be familiar,
because we're familiar with words like engagement
or employment.
And so basically, "ment" is when you get something.
So you get engaged, it's an engagement.
You get employed, it's employment.
So you get disenfranchised, and it's disenfranchisement.
So you're kind of getting an idea.
So it's not something, not enfranchisement,
and that means that you're not getting enfranchised, right,
so that give you kind of a clue.
We can also look at the context of the word
to give us some more information about what it might mean.
So let's look at the sentence again.
So the text says,
"from slavery to segregation disenfranchisement,
"blacks have struggled perhaps more than any other racial group
to assert both their rights and their identity."
It looks like we're kind of listing the hardships
that African-Americans have experienced,
slavery, segregation, disenfranchisement.
So this is something
that black people have not been able to get.
Enfranchise,
they have not be able to get this enfranchisement.
That is a negative thing that has historically happened
for black people.
And the thing is, once you get a lot of practice
in kind of using context clues and word parts
to figure out what words mean
or kind of get a sense of what they mean,
you don't necessarily have to go to the dictionary
and take that time to look it up,
like this is all part of that practice.
We're going to do that today,
so we can get a whole picture of the meaning of the word.
But as you're practicing different strategies
of acquiring new words and vocabulary,
it's more efficient and realistic
that, okay, every single word you encounter
that you don't 100% know the definition of,
you're not necessarily going to pull out a dictionary
and look it up and then that's going to solve the problem.
You want to practice using all of these skills.
You want to practice breaking the word apart,
looking at the syllables and using prefixes and suffixes
to help you kind of figure out what the word means
and also looking at the context,
like, what's happening in the rest of the sentence
to help you figure out what it means.
So now, we are going to look up the word on dictionary.com
and make sure that we were right
and get the full picture of the meaning of disenfranchisement,
so we are going to look up the word disenfranchisement.
And we decided earlier that it means
not be able to get something
and the context was African-American history.
So in African-American history,
this word is referring to something
that African-Americans have not be able to get,
so let's see what that is.
So disenfranchise is to deprive a person of the right to vote
or other rights of citizenship.
So disenfranchisement is the result of African-Americans
being disenfranchised,
not be able to have the right to vote
or other rights of citizenship.