Flashcards can be used for on-the-spot oral quizzes and games. Make a series of flashcards containing common prefixes, such as, "dis," "un," "pre" "mis" and "re." Teach students in advance what each of these prefixes means. Divide the class into two teams and have them line up facing each other. Show a prefix. The first student to lift her hand gets a chance to say what the prefix means. If she gets it right, her team gets a point. If she answers incorrectly, the other team gets a chance at the point. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.
Make a worksheet that helps students learn the proper usage of common prefixes. Write out a paragraph. For each verb requiring a prefix, list three or four different options. Students must choose the appropriate one by writing it in. For example, a sentence might read, "John (mis-/re-/over-) ___took Sam to win the race." Students would have to choose the proper prefix, in this case, "over," and write it in.
Make learning common prefixes more fun with a crossword puzzle. For answers, use words that contain prefixes. Make clues that allow students to guess those words and put them into the grid. For example, a clue could read, "How you fix a mistake," and the answer would be "Undo." For a more advanced class, have students make their own crossword puzzles using common prefixed words as answers.
There are a variety of online activities and games that can help students learn to use prefixes properly. Manythings.org hosts a game that asks players to match common prefixes with their meanings. The game gives players a score and shows them the right answers. TV411.org has a game that gives four sentences at a time that are missing prefixes and asks players to fill in the appropriate prefix. Finally, students can go to HarcourtSchool.com for a game about both prefixes and suffixes with great graphics. The game asks students to add the appropriate prefix or suffix to a word and spits it into a machine.