Teaching prepositions
 

Hello
prepositions are extremely difficult for students of EFL so I was wondering if anyone came up with a list of them with some examples that would include famous quotations or titles or lines from popular songs- something that would make them easy to memorize?
For example:

"addicted to love" (a song)

Re: Teaching prepositions
 

This is an empty post. I don't have any help to offer.

This is something I struggle with, too. Every so often, my students and I will brainstorm phrasal verbs and I'll try to 'fill in the gaps' (if they get 'escape from' I'll ask if they can guess what 'escape to' means).

But, like I said, I think what I'm doing isn't enough. In fact, it's one of the areas where my students seem to be weakest.

So, really, I'm just writing to say that if you find something, you should share it!

Re: Teaching prepositions
 

ok, here it is for surrounded by:

surrounded by idiots (lyrics)

also mr.burns' song from the simpsons: "look at all those idiots" (contains the same line):D

this kind of help is very useful for students to memorize the prepositions but it requires a lot of work to find something simply by browsing the web, that's why I was hoping somebody has already done the job before us.

btw. prepositions are definitely a nightmare for the majority of students and everything that may help is welcome.

Re: Teaching prepositions
 

Hello there,

A good one for practising the prepositions (not introducing them)
Yes how about a game in pairs or groups. Student A hides an object in the classroom. Student B asks: "is it in your desk?" is it in your bag? is it under your book? is it on your desk, is it next to your book?

Swap over when the object is found.

A good idea for introducing the prepositions and working with them "live": Using a group of students do a demo first up front. Give them a preposition to demonstrate with their bodies, working together. Let them use their imaginations. For example "under" could be one student lying down while the others make a bridge over him or her by getting down on all fours - legs on one side of the student on the floor, hands on the other. They could do it in a more boring way by just holding their arms over the student if your floor is dirty or you are paranoid about dirt.

I should post on these forums more often as I just had that idea right now and I will add it to my book!

Another idea I use is a story where my dog runs all over the house chasing a cat. The cat goes under the bed, up the stairs, down the stairs and so on. The dog does various things like go back downstairs and check the cat bowl for cat biscuits, and so on. All fascinating if you are into pets! If you are not into pets, chances are many of your pupils will be. Aside from in South Korea where I think they eat them don't they?

So I give the kids a background of a house and two little miniature pics of a cat and a dog. They then move the cat and dog around physically while I tell the story (or better get a good student to tell the story). Tell the story again, this time for a variant the kids act out the prepositions whenever they hear them. Under can be holding up a book over your head - any action that conjures up the meaning of the preposition is fine.

Here are lesson plan ideas on teaching ESL prepositions with games.

All the best
Shelley