Instructions Time Teaching Exer

8/6/2019 Instructions Time Teaching Exer

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PREPOSITIONS OF TIME

AT:

- at 4 oclock

- at Christmas / at Easter- at the weekend- at the moment- at dawn- at noon- at night- at midnight

IN:

- months: - In April

- seasons: in winter

- years: in 1960, in the sixties

- centuries: in the 20 th century

- in the morning

- in an hour

Expressions: in a minute, in a few days, in time (before its too late) and ontime ( at the right time).

ON:

- days: on Monday, on Sunday morning

- dates: on the 4th of July

During: the war / a party / a trip


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Instructions: Choose the correct preposition

Q1 - My birthday's ...... May

in

on

at

Q2 - She'll be away ...... next week

since

at

until

Q3 - The exam is ...... the tenth of December

in

on

at

Q4 - I always have dinner with my family ..... Christmas Day

in

at

on

Q5 - In Spain, they give each other presents ..... Christmas Eve

in

on

at

Q6 - The lecture finished ..... five thirty

at

on

in

Q7 - I hate it when people telephone ......... I'm having dinner

during

while

for

Q8 - I like to go to a party ....... New Year's Eve


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in

on

at

Q9 - The term is from September ...... December

at

for

to

Q10 - He hasn't worked ....... he lost his job

since

for

by

Q11 - The car won't be ready ..... Friday

until

in

since

Q12 -You must see Paris ..... the Spring

in

on

at

Q13 - He doesn't start work until late .... the afternoon

on

in

at

Q14 - Snow generally falls ..... February

in

on

atQ15 - People give chocolate eggs as presents ...... Easter

on

in

at

Q16 - Did I miss anything ........ I was on the phone?


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while

during

for

Q17 - I have lessons .... Mondays and Wednesdays

in

on

at

Q18 - He didn't do the work ...... his boss got angry

since

for

until

Q19 - She was off work ...... a fortnight

for

at

in

Q20 - Nobody spoke ...... the film

during

since

on

Q21 - It's always colder ....... November than September

on

in

at

Q22 - Their first child was born ..... the spring

on

at

inQ23 - I've known him ....... a long time

since

for

at

Q24 - People celebrate Guy Fawkes' Night ..... the fifth of November


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on

in

at

Q25 - They'll deliver .......... two weeks

at

within

by

Q26 - I'll see you ..... ten o' clock

at

on

in

Q27 - She died ..... 1993

on

in

at

Q28 - We made lots of friends .......... we were in Mexico

during

while

since

Q29 - It gets very cold ..... winter

on

at

in

Q30 - She was born ..... 1985

at

on

inQ31 - In England they say .... the weekend

on

at

in

Q32 - In America they say..... the weekend


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at

on

in

Q33 - Her birthday's ..... June

in

on

at

Q34 - I'll be seeing them ...... a month's time

on

in

at

Q35 - I leave home very early ..... the morning

on

at

in

Q36 - We left ..... Monday

at

on

for

Q37 - He's been with the company ........ the summer

since

for

at

Q38 - She's going on holiday ...... Xmas

in

at

onQ39 - The Black Death occurred ..... the Middle Ages

in

on

at

Q40 - I'll be working ...... the summer holidays


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on

during

while

Q41 - Leaves fall ..... Autumn

on

at

in

Q42 - She was Prime Minister ....... ten years

in

for

since

Q43 - The law was changed ..... the nineteenth century

in

on

at

Q44 - He'll be here ..... a moment

in

on

at

Q45 - Term finishes ..... a Thursday for some reason

at

in

on

Q46 - Their wedding is .... the eleventh of July

in

on

atQ47 - I worked there ....... five years

since

for

in

Q48 - I haven't seen her ........ April


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at

on

in

Q57 - The strike started .... the fifteenth of May

in

on

at

Q58 - More people have heart attacks ..... Monday morning than at any other time

on

in

at

Q59 - She got pregnant ....... eighteen

at

in

on

Q60 - The results come out .... July

on

in

at

Q61 - There is a public holiday ........ May the first

on

in

at

Q62 - I haven't seen her ..... the last meeting

for

since

byQ63 - She was born ..... Christmas Eve

on

at

in

Q64 - The flower blossoms .... early April


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on

at

in

Q65 - I didn't have a chance to speak ......... the meeting

during

for

while

Q66 - Traffic is terrible .... rush hour

in

while

until

Q67 - She left her job ....... August

in

on

at

Q68 - Her birthday is ..... a Tuesday this year

on

at

in

Q69 - We met ...... a foggy day in March

on

at

in

Q70 - Their car was broken into ..... Saturday night

in

at

onQ71 - He worked there ...... two years

for

since

in

Q72 - The contract was signed ..... 1984


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in

on

at

Q73 - They're leaving ...... June

on

in

at

Q74 - I was ill ...... a week

since

while

for

Q75 - I worked there ...... July till September

in

to

from

Q76 - He was born ..... 1968

in

on

at

1.My doctor's appointment is ____January 5th _____10:00.

at, on

on, at

in,to

2.Christmas break has arrived! See you again ____ two weeks time.

at

to

in

3.The school will be closed ____ December 23rd. ____ January 5th.

in, to

from, to

on, to

4. The school dance starts _____ 8:00 o'clock ____ Friday evening.


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at, on

at, at

in, on

5. Let's meet in front of the subway station ____ 7:45. We can make it toschool ____ less than fifteen minutes.

to, in

on, at

at, in

6. Do you want to shop for Boxing Day specials? The stores open ____ 8:00_____ December 26th.

at, in

at, on

to, on

Teaching tips and suggestions for teaching the prepositions of time and place, at, on and in.

Introduction | Student-generated corpus data |Gap filling | Illustrating IN, AT and ON|Office and living room| Hands tied | When did it happen? | Wheres the best place to

live?| Working times

Introduction

Prepositions are probably one of the trickiest areas of English grammar, and yet there is little

systematic study of prepositions in major coursebooks. This could be due to three reasons:

that prepositions are best learned along with their accompanying nouns or verbs,

i.e. as part of a phrase rather than being on their own. that prepositions, along with other small grammatical words, are often more

complicated and elusive than the big structures, like verb tenses.

it is easier to explain the uses of present continuous than in, for example. thatprepositions and their accompanying phrases are something that students

acquire, rather than consciously learn and so there is no point focusing

exclusively on a single preposition.

Whether or not any (or all) of the above is true, it is probably worth the teachers time to drawstudents attention to prepositions in English and help students unlock the secrets of this area.

Student-generated corpus data

Corpus data is a collection of written and spoken language stored on a computer and used forlanguage research. Dictionary and coursebook writers use corpus data to help write material.Linguists use corpus data to find out more about how people use English. However, this data, inits raw form, is difficult for teachers to access and make use of in their classes. David Willis, and
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more recently Scott Thornbury, have been advocating that students create their own corpus datafrom texts that they have encountered in their coursebooks.

Prepositions seem like an ideal area to start with when students are making their own corpus.Here for example are six examples of in taken from different texts in an intermediate coursebook:

This is the place for trainers, and not precisely the trainers you run in.Several markets all in the same place.

Use of colour yellow in newspapers was an amazing innovation.

Many people knew the X-men from a popular cartoon series in the 1990s.Hugh Jackman is brilliant in the role of Wolverine.

The most important effects will be in the field of medicine.

Taken from Looking Forward 1 Workbook, by David Spencer, Macmillan 2002

Once students have collected several examples of the preposition in context from texts they haveencountered, you can begin to analyse the segments and look for patterns. The examples of inabove all describe things in relation to other things that surround them (run in trainers, in the

same place, in newspapers, in the 1990s, in the role, in the field). Students should be encouragedto start a page in their notebooks where they can record examples of prepositions in this way.

Gap filling

Because prepositions are so overwhelmingly common, they can be found in almost any text. Thisoften means that a well-intentioned teacher will take a text and eliminate all the prepositions,making a gap fill for students to complete. While this is not a bad exercise, its usefulness islimited if there is no effective follow up. The danger is that the students arent able to correctlycomplete the gaps, the teacher has no satisfactory answer as to why they made mistakes andeveryone is left agreeing that prepositions are very difficult.

A more measured approach would be to delete only one preposition (for example, all theinstances of in or on) and explain that the gaps only need to be filled by the same word. Thenconcentrate on that preposition and the words that surrounded it.

A more difficult exercise type has also been suggested by Thornbury, in which you prepare a textand remove all the examples of the key word you want to focus on. Students then try to put themissing word back into text where it belongs. Here is an example:

There are 7 examples of the word AT that are missing from this text. Can you put them back inthe correct places?

He was work, sitting quietly his desk. Shes not here, he thought, what on earth was she

playing? His suggestion she had promised to visit him the end of the day, when everyone

had left. But she still hadnt come. six oclock Im leaving he thought. Ten past sevenhe was still there.

Answer:

He was at work, sitting quietly at his desk. Shes not here, he thought, what on earth wasshe playing at? At his suggestion she had promised to visit him at the end of the day,

when everyone had left. But she still hadnt come. At six oclock Im leaving he

thought. At ten past seven he was still there.


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Many of the examples in this text refer to the uses of AT that were mentioned above, as well astwo expressions (playing at and at his suggestion).

Illustrating IN, AT, ON with gestures and simple diagrams

If you havent done so already, one logical way of explaining AT, IN, ON is through gestures or

pictures.

For IN:

Use your hands to make a circular gesture around yourself.

For ON:

Hold one hand palm upwards, tap your palm with the tips of your fingers on your

other hand.

For AT:

Stand next to a chair, table or desk and point down at the desk.

Office and living room

Having students draw pictures and dictate them to each other to copy will inevitably bring upprepositions. Often prepositions of space like next to, under, above will also come up. Here is oneway of doing a picture dictation, which reviews furniture vocabulary:

1. Divide the class into two groups of the same number of students, A and B.2. Tell the As that they must draw a picture of an office and include six or seven

objects of office vocabulary (e.g. desk, armchair, plant, photocopier)

3. Tell the Bs that they must draw a picture of a living room and include six or seventhings which you typically find in a living room (e.g. television, sofa,

bookcase)

4. Give them a time limit to finish their drawings. Write the furniture vocabulary

words up on the board for students to refer to.5. Ask each student A to work with a student B. Without showing his/her picture, A

dictates to B everything that is on his/her picture while B draws. Then swap roles,

with B describing and A drawing.6. Circulate and make notes of any problems they have with prepositions.

7. Finally, ask them to compare their drawings. Focus on the errors that students

made with the prepositions.

Hands tied

A great way to practise prepositions of space is to use actual blocks for students to use.

Cuisinaire rods, or Lego blocks are perfect for this. There are several ways of exploiting them.The following is a way that I used them with a secondary class in Mexico.

1. Draw a simple picture of a structure that the students should reproduce with their

rods or lego.

2. Give each pair of students in the class enough pieces for them to build thestructure you drew a picture of.


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3. Ask one student from each pair to come up and look at the picture youve drawn.

Explain that they can study the picture for only one minute.

4. When they have seen the picture, ask each student to go back and sit down facingtheir partner.

5. Tell them to put their hands behind their backs.

6. The students must now describe how to make the structure to their partners,without taking their hands from behind their backs.

You can follow this up by asking them to make their own structures and explain to their partnerhow to make them.

You can help students remember prepositions by asking them to personalise them. Here aresome activities to personalise in, at, on for time and space.

When did it happen?

Give students a copy of the following skeleton text:

An Important Event

I was at/on/in __________________ (place) when it happened. It was at ___________ (time) on___________ (day). It was in ___________ (month), in ___________ (year). I remember that Ifelt ___________ (how did you feel?).

Ask them to complete the text, then read it to a partner. Can their partner guess what the eventwas? You can do the same text but change the title to read A frightening event/My happiestmoment/My worst moment etc.

Wheres the best place to live?

Bring in a map of the city, town where you are teaching. Ask students to tell you where the bestplace to live in the city is. As students begin to tell you, elicit the following prepositional phrases:on street, in the centre, in neighbourhood, at the end of street. Do the same activity withthe following questions:

Wheres the most dangerous part of the city?

Where are the best restaurants/discos?

Whats the most boring/ugliest part of the city?

Working times

The following questionnaire is for business students to practise the prepositions IN, ON, AT fortime. It can be easily adapted for general English.

Working times questionnaire:


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Documents

Instructions Time Teaching Exer