Primary School English Quiz - Synonyms 3 - Spot the Synonyms (Questions)

In the previous quizzes we have learnt about words that are synonyms and antonyms. Synonyms are words that are similar in meaning to a particular word and antonyms are words that are opposite in meaning to a particular word. We know that there can be more than one similar word, whether they are synonyms or antonyms.

We have also learned that several words that are antonyms of a particular word are formed by adding prefixes to the word and these words are normally the unique opposites. We learned about antonyms that are formed by adding prefixes such as MIS, UN, IL, IM and DIS to a word. Usually, the prefix is just placed before the word to form the antonym and there is no change to be made to the original word.

Not all words that have these prefixes are antonyms of the original word. In fact, they start with these letters and they are stand-alone words and are root words. It so happens that the first few letters appear to be prefixes. For instance, the word DISBURSE is not formed by adding 'dis' to 'burse'. Similarly, MISER is a root word and so is IMMACULATE.

There are other examples of such words that resemble prefixes. One way to find out if these words are not formed from adding prefixes is to check if the rest of the letters after removing the prefix makes sense. If they do, in all probability, the meaning of that word may not be close to what the word represents. Words from any part of speech such as nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs or prepositions can have synonyms all belonging to the same part of speech. In the quiz that follows there are ten words which begin with these prefixes but are not formed from other words. By playing the quiz you will learn some of their synonyms and their antonyms and thus expand your vocabulary.