The Power of Prepositions & How to Teach Them
- Padgett Hiew
- Apr 8
- 6 min read
Mighty Prepositions
Prepositions may be small, but they are mighty! These unassuming words demonstrate a relationship between two or more people, things, or places, acting as the essential links that give clarity to our language. Prepositions are foundational because it helps children develop an understanding of spatial awareness and provides them with the words to describe multiple objects in relation to each other. Cases where this is much-needed is when they need to:
follow instructions (“put the juice box in the bin?”)
Request for help (“help me look under the couch”)
understand where objects or people are in relation to one another, be it in real-life or in stories (“the pencil fell under the table” “Bob climbed up the tree”)
Prepositions can tell information about things like location (the place of an object in relation to or landmark):
“The ball is in the pit.”
“What is under the rock?”
“Look between the cracks.”
Time (when something happens or its duration):
“He arrived before lunch.”
“Can you finish the report by Friday?”
“Call me after the meeting.”
And direction (the movement from one point to another):
“She drove from the university.”
“Did you swim across the sea?”
“Go through the red doors.”
Some of the earlier-emerging and more frequently used prepositions include up, down, in, out. However, some may develop later, like “through and between. Overlapping meanings may also contribute to the difficulty in acquiring a certain preposition. To give an example, you can use the preposition on as a locative expression like “He put the bowl on the table,” or you can use it as a temporal expression like “He came on time.” One word, but a plethora of meanings!
Often, incidental learning (e.g. daily conversation, natural interactions) is sufficient for children to develop their expressive and receptive language. However, it is insufficient for children with communication delays or disorders. Therefore, explicit instruction may be needed - to teach them directly.
Steps to teach prepositions
Repeat prepositions as much as you can!
Structured, repetitive instruction is essential. If your child is not of school-age yet, there are lots of opportunities to use frequent modelling at home. To give an example, you may want to work on to as a locative preposition. If you find they are particularly fond of a specific toy (e.g. a car), you can make use of it. I find that initially modelling prepositions with negation (i.e., using the word “not”) are very effective.
Modelling prepositions with negation (i.e., using the word “not”) are very effective.
For example, let’s say you were playing with a car and racetrack and focusing on the preposition “on”. You could first purposefully place the car in positions that are not “on” the racetrack. You can place the car under the table and say “this is not on the racetrack.” Then, you can move the car beside the racetrack, but then say “this is (still) not on the racetrack.” Finally, you can place the car onto the racetrack, and say “the car is on the racetrack!!” You can do this over and over again, while repeating the associated action of putting the car on the racetrack. Be sure to pair your words with lots of facial expressions and emotions. You can use a concerned, frowning, worried face when using the preposition with “not”, and an excited happy face when you finally say the target preposition. Children LOVE exaggerated facial expressions and they’ll help with your child’s understanding of new vocabulary. However, note that it’s best to keep it short and sweet when possible to keep your child engaged.
Provide multiple models of new prepositions
Feel free to use the same preposition in as many contexts as possible! It will help the child come to a realization that prepositions are able to appear in various environments. For example, you can use the same preposition “on” in another context unrelated to playing with a toy, like “jumping on the trampoline” or “putting clothes on the hanger”
You can also help strengthen your child’s understanding by using the antonym counterpart of their target preposition. For example, when you remove the car from the racetracks, you can express, “the car is off the table!” Other common opposite pairs include above and below, in front of and behind, and before and after.
Test your child's comprehension of prepositions
Once your child shows an understanding of a target preposition in a structured situation, you may want to see how exactly they will generalize this learned response to a similar but non-identical situation. Children with communication disabilities or delays may find it difficult to apply what they’ve learned in a different environment, so it is necessary to check whether their comprehension is holistic or not.
[Children] may find it difficult to apply what they’ve learned in a different environment.
You can test your child’s understanding of a preposition in games like Simon Says. As mentioned in Crane-Deklerk (2020), it has been found that multimodal/multisensory learning has benefits in strengthening brain connections. This means the combination of kinesthetics and language may be even more effective than just using language. Thus, Simon Says would be quite useful, and the child can use their newfound knowledge of prepositions to move their bodies into various positions. Here are some examples of prompts that can be used in Simon Says, based on the three types of prepositions introduced earlier (location, time, direction):
Simon Says…
Location
“Raise your hands above your head”
“Stand behind me”“Highfive the person next to you”
Time
“Jump up after you turn around”
“Hop on one foot until I say stop”
“Pat your head while you rub your stomach”
Direction
“Step away from the wall”
“Walk across the room”
“Crawl under the table”
Even in daily tasks, you can easily incorporate prepositions anytime, anywhere. You can also incorporate imperatives (commands) (e.g. “(please) put the car in the bin,”) and interrogatives (questions) (e.g. “Can you (please) put the car in the bin?”). Chores and clean-up time are great opportunities to work on prepositions! You might want to tell your child to grab you something “under the sink,” or for them to “stack plates on top of each other.”
Another fun idea is to purposefully say the wrong preposition and let your child correct you. For example, when you are setting the table for dinner you can say “The plate is under the table! The fork is under the table”. Your toddler will think it’s hilarious and jump in to correct you! This also creates a fantastic opportunity for your child to practice using their prepositions without you explicitly asking them to say the words. As adults, we want to create natural opportunities for our children to use words rather than only asking them questions or asking to repeat after us (e.g., we want to avoid telling our child: “Say ‘on’! Say ‘under’!”.”
The possibilities are endless! They will help you to see what level of understanding your child is currently at in terms of a target preposition.
Test your child's production of prepositions
Comprehension comes before production, which means that individuals will typically understand something before they are able to use it themselves. But once comprehension is attained, you can work on their own usage of the language.
Joint reading is highly beneficial; there are many picture books that are useful for teaching prepositions. As a child, some of my favourites were the “I Spy” books and “Where’s Spot?” To prompt your child to use prepositions, you can ask things like, “Where is the car on the shelf?” Books are a great tool for encouraging children to use prepositions in a natural and engaging way, and helps them understand and use prepositions by associating them with specific locations and contexts in the story.
Even without such books, you can improvise using prepositions with your own picture books at home. Scavenger hunts (indoors or outdoors) may also be a fun and effective way to target prepositions. You can have your child hide objects in the room and pretend you’re unable to find them, and you can ask, for example, “where is the truck?” This can allow your child to give you a hint (e.g. “it’s in the living room”). If your child uses the preposition correctly, you can affirm “yes, I see!” If your child doesn’t use the preposition correctly (e.g. “it’s on the living room”), you can model the correct response.
In conclusion, although prepositions may seem tiny, they have a big role to play in language development, especially for children with communication delays or disorders. With targeted instruction and practice (which is key!), children can master words and unlock the ability to convey complex ideas about space, time, and direction.
Works Cited
Crane-Deklerk, K. (2020). Multimodality in Early Childhood Education. International Journal of Literacy, Culture, and Language Education, 1, 73–87. https://doi.org/10.14434/ijlcle.v1i0.29481
Let us know if you have any fun ways to introduce prepositions! Find us on instagram @chattytherapy to get more speech and language resources.
Chatty Therapy is based in Edmonton, AB. We have wonderful speech-language pathologists who can give you more specific ideas on how to work with your child to develop their language skills and tailor it to your daily routine. Speech-language pathologists specialize in helping children understand others and express themselves better. Click here to learn more about our services or book a free 15-minute consultation.
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