Affixes with Opposite Meanings

A LESSON PLAN FOR ENGLISH LANGUAGE TEACHERS

Prefixes and suffixes with opposite meanings memory game.

By: Alex Case

Level: Advanced

Theme: General

Study Area: Prefixes & Suffixes

Download Lesson Plan (PDF) 238 KB

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Lesson Plan Content:

Affixes with opposite meanings reversi game

Instructions

Fold the cards if they aren’t already folded. Spread the cards across the table, either side up. Choose one of the cards and guess what word with the opposite meaning is on the other side. If you are correct, you can do the same with another card. If you have done both correctly, you can choose to continue or stop there. You can do the same until you have guessed six in a row correctly, until you give up or until you make a mistake. However, if you make a mistake you lose all the cards from that round, so it is sometimes best to stop before you reach the maximum of six cards. For example, if you have done four cards correctly and stop there you get four points, but if you try one more card you could get five points or you might get zero if you get the fifth one wrong. You can’t stop at one card, but must do at least two each time. Cards you won in previous rounds are safe, i.e. you can only lose the points from this turn if you make a mistake.

Continue playing until all the cards are gone or your teacher stops the game

Ask about any which you don’t understand, can’t pronounce, etc, then test each other on the language in pairs by:

Reading out one side of the card and seeing if your partner can say the other side
Reading out the end of the word without any prefix and seeing if your partner can add two possible prefixes (with other acceptable prefixes not on the cards also okay)
Reading out both prefixes and seeing if your partner can put both in front of a suitable word (the one on the cards or any other correct word)
Reading out one prefix and seeing if your partner can say a word with that and the opposite of that word

Affixes with opposite meanings presentation

Match the pairs of prefixes to these meanings, first of all without looking at the cards if possible. Sometimes more than one answer is possible.

a thousand/ a thousandth
after/ before
against, hating or stopping/ for, liking or helping
between/ inside
big or overall/ small or detailed
different/ the same
forward/ behind
good/ bad
loving/ hating
new/ old or original or source
one/ many
ten/ a tenth
too much/ too little
two/ half
two/ one
under or less than/ more than

Cards to cut up/ Suggested answers

anti-American	pro-American
antibiotic	probiotic
benefactor	malefactor
benevolent	malevolent
biannual	semi-annual
bicameral	unicameral
decalitre	deciletre
dialogue	monologue
downside	upside
duopoly	monopoly
foresight	hindsight
Francophile	Francophobe
heterosexual	homosexual
heterogeneous	homogeneous
inner ear	outer ear
internet	intranet
interspecies	intra-species
kilogramme	milligram
macro-analysis	microanalysis
macroeconomics	microeconomics
malformed	well-formed
malnourished	well-nourished
megabank	micro-bank
megafauna	micro-fauna
megamall	mini-mall
misinformed	well-informed
mistreated	well-treated
mono-cultural	multicultural
monogamy	polygamy
monoglot	polyglot
monolingual	multilingual
multilateral	unilateral
neo-Fascist	proto-Fascist
overpass	underpass
overdeveloped	underdeveloped
post-industrial	pre-industrial
post-war	pre-war
subhuman	superhuman
subsonic	supersonic
subtitles	surtitles
thoughtful	thoughtless
transgender	cisgender