WORDY WEDNESDAY--Prefixes Having to Do With Heat

We are having a heat wave here in Indiana. We have had temperatures above ninety degrees this week. Today it was 92 degrees--a perfect day to go swimming and a perfect day to get a sunburn!

For today's WORDY WEDNESDAY, I thought we would look at two prefixes that have to do with July in Indiana--SOL and THERM.


If you have been reading Language Lady very long, you know my two rules of thumb for learning:

1. You know more than you think you know.

2. Use what you already know to learn even more!

Those two rules of thumb definitely apply to today's prefixes.+

We encourage our students to take a key word--any word that you already know--that has to do what you are trying to learn.

In the case of sol and therm, you can take two words you already know as your "key words" to help you remember these two prefixes:

SOL--solar....you know that solar means sun if you have ever talked about a solar blanket for your pool, solar power (generating power through the sun), or solar eclipse

THERM--thermos or thermal...you know that THERM means heat if you have ever carried your soup or coffee in a thermos or had "thermal underwear" on in the winter to keep you warm.

So...take your two KEY WORDS and use them any time you see the prefixes SOL and THERM:

1. Sol
a. solar
b. solarium--part of a room that is exposed to the sun
c. solstice--the pointer in which the sun stands sill


2. Therm
a. thermoplastic
b. thermos
c. thermodynamics
d. thermoelectric


The "solar heat" is high right now in Indiana, and the thermometer shows it at in the low nineties!

+Remember: A prefix is an affix. An affix is a letter or letters attached to a word that give more meaning to the word. The affix itself actually has meaning. A prefix is an affix that is added to the beginning of a word--thus, the prefix to the word prefix PRE (meaning before)!