By Laura Payne
What do those little words known as prepositions do? They describe the relationships between words and answer questions such as how, where and when. A previous post titled Playing with Prepositions of Place focused on helping a child learn common prepositions of place. You can also help your children learn prepositions of time and when to use which preposition.
Prepositions of time answer the questions of when and for how long. The three most common prepositions of time are at, in and on.
At is used with clock times and times of day.
He ate breakfast at 8:00 a.m.
My favorite show is on at 9:30 p.m.
I like to read at night.
John has orange juice at breakfast every day.
*Note: With the general times the word time could be added without changing the meaning of the sentence.
In is used with months, seasons, years, longer periods of time and times of day.
Lisa’s birthday is in September.
We like to snowboard in the winter.
My brother graduated from college in 2012.
Cars were invented in the 19th century.
Grandma was a teacher in the 1980s.
They always drink tea in the afternoon.
*Note: With seasons and general times the word time could be added without changing the meaning of the sentence.
On is used with days of the week, days + parts of days, special days and dates.
My dad went grocery shopping on Tuesday.
Tom is going skateboarding on Saturday afternoon.
We bang pans together on New Year’s Eve.
Summer vacation starts on June 12th.
Help Your Child Learn Prepositions of Time by Playing a Game
Take a six-sided die and write at on two sides of the die, in on two sides and on on two sides. Use 10 to 12 index cards and write down the name of a different activity on each card. You can have your children help you select the activities to write on the cards to make it more fun.
Here are some suggestions for activities: snowboarding, reading, cooking, singing and biking.
How to Play the Game
1. Place the cards face down in a pile.
2. The first player rolls the die and selects one card from the pile.
3. The player then creates a sentence using the preposition and event correctly.
4. Continue play clockwise for as many rounds as you like
Here are some example sentences to get you started:
Mary sings to her dad on his birthday.
Scott reads the newspaper in the morning before he goes to school.
Joe started cooking dinner at 5:00 o’clock in the evening. (You can give bonus points for using two prepositions in one sentence.)
About Laura Payne
A self-confessed language nerd, Laura Payne is the mother of two boys, and she is a part-time English teacher. She has also done freelance writing about several topics including the structure and grammar of English.
