Indo-European languages

High school (ages 12+)
People & Society

Name:

Date:

Step 1 · Read the article

Open the article and read it at the level above. Then answer the questions below in your own words.

https://smallwhale.org/articles/indo-european-languages

Write what each word means, using the article.

Do not copy the article. Write two things you learned, the way you would explain them to a friend.

Answers below are taken from the article’s stored facts, so they match what the student read.

1. How big is Indo-European languages?Pontic-Caspian steppe (Eastern Europe)
2. What is the estimated number of speakers?Approximately 3.2 billion individuals
3. What is the estimated time of origin?Circa 4500-2500 BCE for Proto-Indo-European
4. What is the Indo-European language family?It is a huge group of languages spoken by about half of the world's people. They all come from a common ancestor called Proto-Indo-European.
5. Where did Proto-Indo-European come from?It probably began in the Pontic-Caspian steppe, a big grassy plain between 4500 and 2500 BCE. The Kurgan hypothesis says it spread with the Yamnaya culture.

Comparative Method: A technique used in historical linguistics to reconstruct unattested proto-languages by comparing attested daughter languages.
Lexicon: The vocabulary of a language or a branch of linguistics concerned with the study of words.
Phonological Change: Systematic alterations in the sound system of a language over time, leading to diversification.