Lesson 4: LEXICAL
Two of a Kind
Today you will be introduced to lexical categories and fill in the Lexical Category Notes.
Lexical Category
A lexicon is a speaker’s mental dictionary that contains information about the meaning of words.
Lexical categories are used to group words, and the five lexical categories are:

Noun, Verb, Adjective, Preposition, and Adverb.
There are five types of non-lexical categories:

Determiner, Degree word, Qualifier, Auxiliary, and Conjunction.
There is one major criterion for determining a word’s lexical category: the word’s meaning and
use in the sentence.
Example: often the word “the” would be seen as a determiner, but if we use the word to specify
what type of noun we are looking for, then it becomes an adjective because it is describing that
noun—the dress refers to only one type of dress, not a dress because a dress refers to any number
of dresses.
Complete the Lexical Categories Worksheet.
Lesson Wrap-Up: What are lexical categories?
Lexical Ambiguity Exercise
1. Introduce yourself to your team members.
2. Each team member must come up with a pair of sentences which have a
word in common but use that word as different lexical categories.
Example:
1. The girl stood near the fence. (preposition)
3. The truck is nearing the garage. (adverb)
4. Using this, each person must fill out an Individual Word Worksheet for his
or her word.
5. As a team, decide which pair of sentences you want the other teams to try
and interpret.
6. When your team has chosen, write the team number and the sentence pair on
the board, with a blank space where the lexically ambiguous word should
go.
7. The teams will write down their guesses of the word and its lexical
categories.
Team Member Name
Word used
Signature:_________________________
_______________________
Signature:_________________________
_______________________
Signature:_________________________
_______________________
Signature:_________________________
_______________________
Write the chosen pair of sentences complete with the lexically ambiguous word.
Individual Word Worksheet
Name:_____________________________________________________________
Team Members:_____________________________________________________
Lexically ambiguous word:____________________________________________
What lexical categories does it belong to? ________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
What do those lexical categories mean in context to the word? _______________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
What are the affixes (if any) in this word? How do they change the word’s
meaning? __________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
What are some criterion clues that you could use to determine the lexical
categories? _________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Write your pair of sentences below.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Lexical Category Notes
1. A ____________________________is a speaker’s mental dictionary, that contains
information about the meaning of words.
2. __________________________________________are used to group words.
3. There are five lexical categories, and five non-lexical categories __________ ______
______________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
Sally, girl, home, lotion, honesty, love,
affection
Talk, come, swim, cook, listen, enjoy,
live, laugh
Nice, big, young, smart, gorgeous,
happy, tall, fun
By, under, away from, at, on, in, at, over
Quietly, bravely, honestly, currently,
slowly, honestly
Lexical Categories Examples
Non-lexical Categories Examples
The, a, this, that, those, these, specifies
which noun, (also known as a type of
adjective)
Quite, very (quite tired, very nearw/prepositions)
Always, perhaps, almost (specifies
adverbs) Will, can, should, must (must
walk-position of verb) And, or, but (joins
two or more categories or series)
.
4.
A lexically ambiguous word can be used in two different ways
Examples:
The elephant has a long (trunk).
Put the tennis rackets in the (trunk) of the car.
One criterion for determining a word’s lexical category is to look at the words
and use it in the sentence.
Example: Often, the word “the” would be seen as a determiner, but if we use the word
to specify what type of noun we are looking for, then it becomes an adjective because it
is describing that noun—the dress refers to only one type of dress, not a dress because
a dress refers to any number of dresses.
Lexical Worksheet
Make up two sentences for each word that uses the word in two different lexical
categories.
Write down the two sentences using the word.____________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Indicate if there are any affixes added to the word.__________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Use the word as it appears—without affix addition.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
Example: Comb
Sentence #1: The woman used a____________________________
Sentence #2: The man should ______________________________his hair. Affixes added: none
Lexical categories: noun, verb
1. Hand
Sentence # 1:________________________________________________
Sentence #2: ________________________________________________
Affixes added:______________________________________________________
Lexical categories:___________________________________________________
2. Wrap
#1: _____________________________________________________________
#2:_____________________________________________________________
Affixes added:_____________________________________________________
Lexical categories:_________________________________________________
3. Mad
Sentence #1:_________________________________________________________
Sentence #2:__________________________________________________________
Affixes added:_________________________________________________________
Lexical categories:_____________________________________________________
4. Point
Sentence #1:__________________________________________________________
Sentence #2:__________________________________________________________
Affixes added:_________________________________________________________
Lexical categories:_____________________________________________________
5. Love
Sentence #1:__________________________________________________________
Sentence #2:__________________________________________________________
Affixes added:_________________________________________________________
Lexical categories:_____________________________________________________