English Vocabulary in Use Elementary » Unit 58: Prefixes
Look at the table opposite and write one more example of a word using each prefix. Use a dictionary to help you. Write a sentence using your word.
ex: My ex-boss lives near me.
half: You stop at half-time in a football match.
Prefixes come at the beginning of words. They can help you to understand what a new word means. Here are some common prefixes.
| prefix | meaning | examples |
| ex (+ noun) | was but now isn’t | ex-wife, ex-boyfriend |
| half (+ noun or adjective) | 50% of something | half-price, half-hour |
| in, im (+ adjective) | not | informal, impossible |
| non (+ adjective or noun) | not | non-smoking |
| pre (+ noun, adjective, verb) | before | pre-school, pre-heat |
| re (+ verb) | again | redo, rewrite |
| un (+ adjective or noun) | not | unhappy, unsafe |
An ex-boyfriend is someone who is no longer your boyfriend.
Something that cost £10 yesterday and costs £5 today is half-price.
A half-hour journey is a journey of 30 minutes.
Informal clothes are clothes like jeans and trainers. Formal clothes are things like a suit.
If something is impossible, you can’t do it. It’s impossible to read with your eyes closed.
You must not smoke in a non-smoking restaurant.
Pre-school children are too young to go to school.
You nearly always need to pre-heat the oven before you cook something.
To redo something is to do it a second time, and to rewrite something is to write it a second time.
Unhappy means sad, the opposite of happy.
Unsafe means dangerous, the opposite of safe.
Sometimes words with prefixes have a hyphen (-), e.g. a half-hour programme, and sometimes they don’t, e.g. an impossible question. Use a dictionary when you are not sure if there is a hyphen or not.
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