KSSR Grammar

Prepositions
Charlotte Lewis

Fun Activities for Prepositions of Time

http://edition.tefl.net/ideas/grammar/fun-activities-prepositions-of-time/

Written by Alex Case for TEFL.net

Prepositions of time SNAP

Prepare playing cards with the preposition of time replaced with a gap, with at
least two different prepositions in the pack and approximately the same number
of cards for each preposition- for example, 10 cards with at missing, 10 cards
with in missing, plus maybe 10 cards with on missing. Give one pack of cards
to each group of two or three students. One person should shuffle the pack and
deal out the cards face down. Students take their cards but cant look at them.
The first person turns over one card and places it face up on the table so that
everyone can see it. The next person does the same thing, placing their card
next to the first one. If the two cards need the same preposition, the first person
to shout Snap! wins all the cards so far and can put them at the bottom of their
pack. If they dont match, those two cards stay on the table and future cards go
on top of them to make two packs of cards. The person with most cards at the
end of the game wins.

Prepositions of time pellmanism (= pairs = memory game)

This can be played with exactly the same cards as SNAP above, but is a slower
game. The pack of cards is spread face down across the table and then people
take turns turning over cards to try and find pairs that have the same preposition
missing. If they match, they keep the cards and score two points. If they need
different prepositions, they have to put them back in the same place and it is the
next persons go.

Prepositions of time sentence completion

Prepare a worksheet or OHP with between 10 and 20 uncompleted personal

sentences that contain prepositions of time, e.g. I wish my birthday was in
__________ or I wake up at __________, but I dont get up until __________ (if you
want the time clauses to be the missing part) or I __________ at quarter past
seven or I love __________ing in winter (if you want to include the time clauses
 KSSR Grammar
Prepositions
Charlotte Lewis

in the gapped sentences). Students fill in at least half the gaps, then read out
just the part they have written so that their partners can try and guess which
sentence it comes from.

Timetables battleships

This is based on the schoolboy game Battleships, in which you try to guess
where your partners ships of different sizes are on their grid and therefore bomb
and sink them. Give students school timetables with the days and times written
in but all the names of the lessons blank. Tell them to add English lessons in
blocks of different lengths without their partner seeing where they have put
them (I usually get them to put English lessons in as a block of three in a line at
the same time everyday, two in a block as a double English lesson in one day,
and one other English lesson on its own). They should then fill the other blanks in
with the names of other school subjects. Students then take turns asking What
do you do/ study at _________ on ___________? in the hope of receiving the
answer English. If their partner does answer English, that is a hit. Any other
answer (e.g. Geography) is a miss. The first person or team to find all their
opponents English lessons wins the game.

Timetables spot the differences pairwork

This is one of several simpler to explain and play games that can also be played
with timetables. Prepare a complete school timetable, e.g. as a Word grid with a
subject name in each box, days along the top and times along the left hand side.
Then prepare a Student B version of the same timetable by changing the names
of between three and five of the subjects. Students then work in pairs to try and
find differences between their timetables without showing them to each other,
e.g. by asking each other What do you do/ study at (half past three) on
(Monday)?

Timetables find your partner

This can be prepared in a similar way to Timetables Spot the Differences

Pairwork above, but you need to prepare lots of different versions so that there
are only two examples of each timetable in the whole class or group. Students
are given one of the timetables that someone else has a copy of, and go around
 KSSR Grammar
Prepositions
Charlotte Lewis

the class (= mingle) asking questions until they are sure they have found the
person who has a matching version.

Timetables running dictation

Put one or several timetables on a distant wall (if they are small enough that
they cant be read from the other side of the classroom) or in a different
classroom or corridor, and give half the class versions with gaps. Their partner
has to run to the completed version of the timetable on the wall, remember the
missing information, and relay that back to their partner so that they can
complete the timetable. To add more communication, make sure that the person
who has the timetable doesnt show it to the person who is running back and
forth.

Dont reach that time

Set a date and time that students should approach by progressing through time,
but mustnt reach or go over. E.g. if you set the time as Dont reach 5 p.m. on
the 7th of May. Start at 8 a.m. on the 1st they can say I played tennis at 8 a.m.
on the 6th of May I did taekwondo at half past four in the afternoon on the 7th
of May etc, but are out of the game if they say I went swimming at 6 p.m. on
the 8th of May. Anyone who goes backwards in time or goes up to or beyond
the time limit you have set loses, and then the game starts again. You need to
make them use a verb each time they speak in order to make sure that they also
use prepositions of time. This can be the same verb every time, verbs of one
particular type (such as the verbs used with sports in these examples), and
future or past tenses.

Songs and videos gapfills

Many pop songs include prepositions of time and so can be used for a gapfill to
test this grammar point. You can take out either the prepositions or the times
after the prepositions, and students can try and guess them before they listen to
the song. Alternatively, you can give sentence stems as comprehension
questions and students can do the task just as with a normal listening (assuming
 KSSR Grammar
Prepositions
Charlotte Lewis

the song is easy enough to understand without seeing the lyrics). Any of these
tasks can also be used with extracts from videos.

Board race

Teams of students are given a preposition of time and race to write as many
correct time clauses as they can with that time clause in three minutes.
Alternatively, give them a time and get them to write times within that period,
each with a preposition of time- e.g. for Monday they can write on Monday
morning, at 7 oclock on Monday etc.

Answer me!

Students are given cards that have a preposition plus time on them, e.g. On
Monday and At a quarter past nine. They have to ask their partner(s)
questions that really get those answers in order to be able to discard those
cards, e.g. When do you least enjoy work? or When do you drink your first cup
of coffee every morning? The person with no cards or least cards when the
game is stopped wins.

Find someone who about real times and dates

Students write true sentences about themselves on slips of paper, using time
clauses in each sentence. The teacher takes these in, shuffles them up, and
deals them out to the class (making sure that no one gets their own slip of paper
back). Each person goes around the class asking questions to try and find the
person who wrote the slip of paper that they have been given, e.g. What time
do you usually get up on Sundays?

Line up by time
 KSSR Grammar
Prepositions
Charlotte Lewis

Ask students to line up in some kind of time order as quickly as possible, e.g. by
the time and date they were born, the position of their birthday in the year, or
the time they got up this morning. It is also possible to play this as a team game
by splitting the class in two and giving points to the first class to line up correctly.
Youll need to make sure they use whole sentences in their questions and
answers (even though it is a bit unnatural), and be very strict about avoiding L1.

Prepositions Stations

Students have to run and touch the right or left wall depending on which
preposition should be used in the sentence the teacher says or shows, e.g. the
right wall if the teacher says I get up _______ 7 oclock and left wall if they say
I went to the zoo ___________ Sunday. Instead of running and touching, students
can jump either side of a line (staying on it if neither of the two prepositions is
correct), throw sticky balls or paper aeroplanes at two different sides of the
board, or just point at or pretend to shoot the right preposition on the board or
wall.

Liar

Students ask each other questions with When? to which their partners must
answer with the preposition plus time clause cards they have been given by the
teacher, e.g. placing down the card On 29th December for When did you last
see your father?. The other students then guess if that answer is a lie or not-
accusing them by saying Liar or staying silent if they think it could be true. If it
is a lie, the person who lied has to take all the cards that are on the table. If
someone says Liar but it is actually true, the person who made the accusation
has to take the cards that are on the table. If no one makes an accusation, the
cards stay on the table for the next round. The person with no cards or the least
cards at the end of the game is the winner.