All about English Prepositions. English ESL/EFL Lesson Plans and Games on the prepositions of location, time, movement and the direction words
All about English Prepositions
Lesson plans
Here you can find a wide range of full lesson plans to use in your classroom.
All of our lessons are designed around themes engaging and relevant to English ESL-EFL learners and can be used to complement your school curriculum, giving students an opportunity to develop their English language and skills in motivating and enjoyable ways.
These lesson plans focus on classroom games and activities oriented around meaningful practice of grammar items in English. The vast majority of the activities have been designed to be simple and easy to apply, without requiring much in the way of additional resources or materials. Wherever possible, games have been presented in a way that makes full use of any natural or genuine communicative aspects embodied in the grammar constructions, though while there is emphasis on understanding the grammar and its functional and communicative aspects, most of the games also highlight the importance of using the grammar accurately.
These lesson plans are intended as a starting point for teachers to adapt and build their own stock of in-class games and activities that can be applied relatively quickly and easily.
All about English Prepositions. Here are four lesson plans on the English Prepositions
Direction and Locational Preposition Vocabulary
Objectives:
To increase the students vocabulary and thereby their understanding of the English language
Presentation:
– Give the students the list of new vocab words to copy down in their notebooks.
1. next to =
2. on the left =
3. on the right =
4. behind =
5. in front of =
6. in =
7. above =
8. below =
9. on =
10. under =
11. between =
12. way =
13. straight
Practice:
– Remind the student’s what a preposition is.
Prepositions are connecting words; they connect the word or words that follow them with some other part of the sentence.
Ex. John works in an office.
– Have the students practice the new list of words by repeating after you as you say each word.
– Have the class practice by going around the room and having each student read the vocabulary words one after the other. It may take some time, but the repetition is good for their memories.
– Now demonstrate the meaning of each word and have the students repeat after you.
– Next, demonstrate, but have the class tell you what new word it is that you are demonstrating. This can be done with props around your classroom, students, or just about anything.
– Have your students describe the classroom using their new words.
Homework:
Have the students continue their practice with the new words. For there homework have them write 5 sentences using the new vocabulary.
Can you help me?
Objective:
Using prepositions to indicate location
Presentation:
This game utilizes prepositions within an appropriate communicative theme – helping somebody to find something.
Practice:
The teacher takes 10-12 simple items into the classroom (for example, a ball, a ruler, a jacket, a book, etc) and then hands each item to a student in the classroom. The teacher then closes his her/eyes for 10 seconds, during which the students place the items in different places in the classroom. The teacher then looks for each item, by asking individual students for help:
Teacher: Susan, can you help me? I can’t find my ruler.
Student 1: It’s under the desk.
Teacher: Under the desk? Under whose desk?
Student 1: It’s under Tony’s desk.
Teacher: Ah yes – thanks! Brian, can you help me? I can’t find my ball.
Student 2: It’s in Steven’s bag.
Etc.
The advantage of this activity is that the communication is relatively genuine, and the students take an active part in setting up the locations. Following the teacher’s model, students themselves could then become the people who try to locate things.
My birthday
Objective:
Using appropriate prepositions of time
Presentation:
This game works from the idea of giving details about an invitation to a birthday party, using appropriate prepositions for time (“in” for months, “on” for days/dates, and “at” for
clock times)
Practice:
The teacher draws a large grid on the whiteboard. Along the top are
students’ names, and down the side are listings for month, day, date and time. The teacher then asks a series of questions to each student to complete the information in the grid, basically:
1) What month is your birthday?
2) What day is your birthday party on?
3) What is the date for your birthday party?
4) What time does the party start?
As these questions are asked to each student (note: you may need to use a calendar and/or encourage students to just use their imaginations, but the more realistic the information the better), the teacher can help students to utilize the correct preposition for
each of the categories (namely, 1 = in, 2 = on, 3 = on, 4 = at). Once the grid is completed, the teacher pretends to have “lost” his/her invitation to each student’s birthday party, and gets the students to help him/her retrieve the information.
Teacher: Fred, when is Sarah’s birthday?
Student 1: It’s in May.
Teacher: Right. And Julie, what day is Sarah’s birthday party?
Student 2: It’s on Thursday.
Teacher: Thanks. Tim, what date is the party?
Student 3: It’s on the 12th of May.
Teacher: Ah, yes. Rebecca, what time does Sarah’s party start?
Student 4: It starts at 6 o’clock.
If this is the students’ first time with applying prepositions of time or they do not yet have the confidence to use ordinal numbers, etc., the information can be scaled back to whichever section seems most appropriate and attainable for the students (for example, just months and days)
My Birthday 2
Objective:
Using appropriate prepositions of time
Presentation/Practice:
This activity draws on the same prepositions as in the previous game, except in this case students are going to report to the class the exact time they were born and the
information is expanded to include years and a specific sequence (as indicated by the teacher). This may very likely require some preparation and a little homework on the part of the students to get set up (i.e., they may need to go home and get the information from their parents).
Each student then takes a turn to state when they were born:
Teacher: What year were you born Michael?
Student 1: I was born in 1992.
Teacher: What month were you born?
Student 1: I was born in July.
Teacher: What date were you born?
Student 1: I was born on the twenty-second.
Teacher: What day were you born?
Student 1: I was born on a Tuesday.
Teacher: What time exactly were you born?
Student 1: I was born at exactly 1.09am.
Following a report like this, students could then be asked to ask each other the details about the time of their birth, recording the information on a piece of paper and/or a preprepared grid. As a fun follow up, students could try to work out exactly how old they are
(in years, months, days, hours and minutes) at that particular time in the classroom.
Find the hidden treasure
Objective:
Applying prepositions to movement
Presentation:
This is essentially a listening activity called “Find the hidden treasure” – designed to help students identify and understand prepositions such as “out of”, “through”, “over”, “into”, “across”, “under”, “around”, etc., as they are applied to movement.
Practice:
The teacher begins by drawing a ‘treasure map’ on the board, which the students copy down onto blank paper. At one side of the map should be a starting point (such as a house) and on the other side should be the hidden treasure in some sort of specific location. The teacher then gives oral directions to the students on how to get to the treasure, and they trace the route on their maps. The teacher then repeats the directions and traces the route on the map on the board. Students compare to see if they have followed the original directions correctly. Students who have done so have found the treasure.
The map should include a variety of obstacles and/or simple landforms to make full use of the variety of possible prepositions of movement. Depending on the map produced, a set of treasure hunt instructions might sound like this:
Teacher:
Go out of your house and down the street – watch out for cars! At the end the street, go to the edge of the lake and get into the boat. Go across the lake (don’t fall out of the boat, because there are some monster fish in the water!) and get out of the boat next to the big tree. Go around the
dark forest (there are goblins in there!), then over the small bridge (the
big bridge is broken and dangerous) and through the tunnel under the
mountains. Go over the railway tracks and through the castle gate into
the castle garden. Go through the castle garden to the big tower. Go up
the stairs to the third floor. You’ll find the treasure there in a big old
wooden chest.
The game can become more interactive by pre-preparing maps for students and having them select their own places for treasure, which they then direct other students to find.
Also Check out these resources on the English prepositions
