What do prefixes do with a German verb?

Question

The approach to explain verbs with prefixes

Answer 1

There is hardly a German student who does not share difficulties in understanding verbs with prefixes. Usually, I use the following strategy. First of all, I comply with the concept of most textbooks and share with them the two types of prefixes: separable and non-separable. Yet, textbooks usually do not explain what prefixes are, especially the detachable ones. Let us take the example of the German verb "arbeiten". Then, I introduce these prefixes: in, aus, vor, nach, be, er, über, weg, um, durch, heraus, hinein, zu, and ab. Once the students understand the meaning of these prefixes, they also understand why a prefix will stick to a verb and why it is separated. After that, the application of the chosen prefix-verb combination begins. Here, I found that a good approach is to contrast (compare) the German sentence with their English equivalent. Example: Dieter muss eine Stunde vorarbeiten, weil er morgen eine Stunde eine Stunde früher gehen möchte. The English translation would be: Dieter has to work one hour in advance (one hour more) because he would like to leave one hour earlier tomorrow. After two more modeled sentences in German with their English translations, I switch to engaging students at a more challenging level of finding a possible translation. The highest level would be when the students could translate an English sentence with the help of a German prefix-connected verb.