Learn English Prepositions: Preposition Collocations

131,385 views ・ 2022-09-30

Adam’s English Lessons


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

00:00
Hi everybody, welcome to www.engvid.com, I'm Adam.
0
0
4460
00:04
In today's video, I want to answer a very common question that I hear from people - from
1
4460
5620
00:10
all of you guys in the comment section.
2
10080
2440
00:12
Why are prepositions so hard?
3
12520
1580
00:14
How can I study prepositions?
4
14100
2220
00:16
So today's video is going to give you a bit of an idea of why they're so hard and what
5
16320
5300
00:21
you can start doing to try to improve your use of prepositions.
6
21620
5500
00:27
And yes, prepositions do make a big difference because they're very little words, but they
7
27120
5080
00:32
can completely change the meaning of an expression or a sentence and so on.
8
32200
5360
00:37
So, the first thing I want to look at are three different ways to approach prepositions.
9
37560
6000
00:43
One is just direct collocations - words that are working together that sometimes have a
10
43560
7360
00:50
different meaning.
11
50920
1000
00:51
So, for example, we have "in-house" with a hyphen, this is going to be used as an adjective,
12
51920
6640
00:58
compared to "out-house", which is one word that joins the two words, "on the house",
13
58560
6360
01:04
and "something is housed in something else".
14
64920
2640
01:07
So, I have four expressions here with "in", "out", "on", and "in" with completely different
15
67560
6600
01:14
meanings and no real way of guessing, and that's the hard part about prepositions.
16
74160
4960
01:19
So, "in-house", so for example, some companies hire an in-house social media manager.
17
79120
7800
01:26
Instead of getting somebody outside, like a freelancer or to outsource something, they
18
86920
4640
01:31
hire somebody full-time to run their social media pages, right?
19
91560
5360
01:36
Or channels.
20
96920
1000
01:37
So, this person is an in-house employee, works inside.
21
97920
4920
01:42
"Out-house", now if you can think of this as an in-house employee, what is an "out-house"?
22
102840
5320
01:48
Now, completely, I'm sure you can't guess.
23
108160
4640
01:52
An "out-house" is a toilet.
24
112800
4080
01:56
It's a toilet that is actually outside, it's not inside the house.
25
116880
4160
02:01
So, especially if you're going to go camping or you're going to go to like some cottage
26
121040
3360
02:04
or cabin, a lot of these buildings or a lot of these houses won't have a toilet inside
27
124400
5360
02:09
the house.
28
129760
1000
02:10
They have a little hut outside or like just basically a box with a hole in the ground
29
130760
5320
02:16
and that's where you go to the toilet, and that is called an "out-house".
30
136080
4080
02:20
And it's one word.
31
140160
1000
02:21
So, if you think you can guess one and guess the opposite, no.
32
141160
4840
02:26
Completely unrelated, so you have to be a little bit careful about that.
33
146000
3600
02:29
"On the house" doesn't mean like on top of the house.
34
149600
4520
02:34
It actually has nothing to do with house.
35
154120
1760
02:35
"On the house" means free, but usually at a restaurant or a bar or anywhere that charges
36
155880
6880
02:42
for a service.
37
162760
1000
02:43
So, if you go to the bartender and you chat the bartender up and you have a nice time,
38
163760
4000
02:47
the bartender will be nice and say, "Now, this drink is on the house."
39
167760
3240
02:51
It means you don't have to pay for it.
40
171000
2360
02:53
The house means the place, the establishment, the business.
41
173360
4340
02:57
The business will pay for it.
42
177700
1620
02:59
They will take the charge.
43
179320
1880
03:01
It's on them, right?
44
181200
1720
03:02
So, on the house.
45
182920
1520
03:04
Now, here, "house" is different.
46
184440
2320
03:06
"House" is a verb, basically means to be like a container to something.
47
186760
5880
03:12
So, something is housed in something means it is inside this container, right?
48
192640
6600
03:19
So, now, here's one situation where you have completely unguessable collocations or idioms
49
199240
9920
03:29
in some cases.
50
209160
1160
03:30
Now, here, I have a few expressions with time.
51
210320
3920
03:34
Now, in the first examples, "in time", "on time", "at the time", all of the uses of time
52
214240
6400
03:40
are the same, and then you have to understand the difference of "in", "on", "at" like you
53
220640
4480
03:45
do with other situations with prepositions, especially with time prepositions.
54
225120
4680
03:49
So, if something is in time, if you do something in time, it means before the limit of time
55
229800
6920
03:56
that you have, right?
56
236720
1160
03:57
So, the project has to be finished in time so that we can start the next phase of it,
57
237880
7200
04:05
for example, right?
58
245080
1520
04:06
It has to finish on time means at the set time.
59
246600
4040
04:10
So, in time, you have, for example, you have this much time to work on it.
60
250640
6520
04:17
In time means somewhere here.
61
257160
3160
04:20
On time means here, at the last spot or a specific spot that you set.
62
260320
5440
04:25
At the time means at that specific time, not before or after, exactly the same.
63
265760
7040
04:32
On time, at the time are similar, but you're going to use them differently, right?
64
272800
5320
04:38
A project has to finish on time, and at that time or at the time, we will begin phase two.
65
278120
8040
04:46
So, on time, usually like a deadline, at the time is a specific time you can do whatever
66
286160
6400
04:52
you want with.
67
292560
1000
04:53
So, a little bit confusing because the time doesn't change.
68
293560
4400
04:57
It's how you're using it with all these other prepositions that changes.
69
297960
3820
05:01
And then you have out of time, means time is finished, no more time.
70
301780
5180
05:06
By the time, so at this time or before, right?
71
306960
5560
05:12
With time, so any pain you have, if somebody broke up with you and your heart is broken,
72
312520
6800
05:19
with time it will mend, right?
73
319320
2400
05:21
So, over some time, over a period of time, and I didn't write that here.
74
321720
4920
05:26
Over time or with time, things will get better, right?
75
326640
4200
05:30
And there's another one, over and with.
76
330840
2720
05:33
Until such a time, time out, like again, going to take a little break, or time out in a game,
77
333560
6680
05:40
you have a time out where you take a pause.
78
340240
2840
05:43
Over time, over time, right?
79
343080
1920
05:45
So, there's over the time, but when you put them together, now you're going beyond the
80
345000
5960
05:50
scheduled time.
81
350960
1120
05:52
So, if you work overtime at work, you finished your 40 hours for the week, now you're working
82
352080
5700
05:57
extra.
83
357780
1540
05:59
In a game that is finished with a tie, they play a little extra time or a little overtime
84
359320
6000
06:05
to decide.
85
365320
1000
06:06
Now, the scary thing is I can give you at least another dozen, maybe even 20 more expressions
86
366320
7720
06:14
with time, with different prepositions.
87
374040
3920
06:17
So, the key is just to understand the use of the word "time".
88
377960
5160
06:23
Here, you don't need to know the word "house", you need to know the whole expression.
89
383120
4320
06:27
Here you need to use the word "time" and then see how it's being used with the different
90
387440
4600
06:32
prepositions.
91
392040
1160
06:33
And then, as you add more expressions, you can start to understand the actual call location.
92
393200
7360
06:40
So, if somebody says to you, for example, "It's about time", they're not talking about
93
400560
7000
06:47
time, time is not the subject of a conversation, it's or it is about time, it means they're
94
407560
5800
06:53
very frustrated, they've been waiting a long time and finally you came, it's about time
95
413360
5920
06:59
that you came, etc.
96
419280
1680
07:00
So, I'll get back to this in a minute.
97
420960
3280
07:04
And then there's the last one, now, "agree to", "agree with", etc.
98
424240
4080
07:08
A lot of people confuse these types of call locations with phrasal verbs.
99
428320
6680
07:15
These are not phrasal verbs, these are just call locations where you're using a certain
100
435000
4120
07:19
verb with a certain preposition for a certain purpose.
101
439120
4280
07:23
So if you agree to, then you still agree, you agree to do something, or you agree to
102
443400
7360
07:30
the demands of the company, means you accept, right?
103
450760
5280
07:36
But you're generally agreeing to do something.
104
456040
4320
07:40
Agree with means share an opinion, or agree with the rules, agree with someone means you
105
460360
8200
07:48
share an understanding that you accept the same thing, so very similar.
106
468560
5640
07:54
Agree about, again, now you - there's a specific topic and you have agreement.
107
474200
5040
07:59
So, the "agree" doesn't change.
108
479240
2480
08:01
What comes after the preposition changes to suit the purpose, right?
109
481720
5720
08:07
So, this is where it becomes a little bit tricky.
110
487440
2960
08:10
Here, the preposition changes in reaction to time and what's happening.
111
490400
4880
08:15
Here, the preposition changes in reaction to what comes after, to the purpose or the
112
495280
6800
08:22
target of the agreement, and so on.
113
502080
3200
08:25
Agree on, so we agree on the timing for the project to be completed, for example.
114
505280
7200
08:32
So, an "agree in" will generally take something else.
115
512480
3720
08:36
You agree in principle, you agree in writing.
116
516200
3320
08:39
So just because I say I agree with you in a legal context doesn't mean anything.
117
519520
5420
08:44
If we agree in writing, means we wrote it out and both signed it, then we have an agreement,
118
524940
6060
08:51
right?
119
531000
1000
08:52
So, the reason I'm showing you the three different ways to look at prepositions is so that you
120
532000
5440
08:57
can start collecting these collocations, like keep them in a notebook.
121
537440
5240
09:02
So, you have to study these like vocabulary.
122
542680
3760
09:06
Of course, know the difference between "in", "on", "at", "for", "of", "from", etc.
123
546440
6120
09:12
"Over", "under", "next to", "between", etc.
124
552560
4060
09:16
Know all of those and their functions, but start collecting collocations that are idiomatic,
125
556620
9300
09:25
collocations that are just collocations, and collocations that work before and after the
126
565920
6520
09:32
main verb.
127
572440
1080
09:33
And also remember, it doesn't have to be a verb, it could be a noun or a verb, right?
128
573520
5200
09:38
Time out, agree to the verb, the noun, the adjective, the preposition.
129
578720
5560
09:44
Start learning all of these different collocations, and then you'll see that you can start making
130
584280
5080
09:49
different expressions as well, okay?
131
589360
2880
09:52
And that's basically it.
132
592240
1480
09:53
Now, the main thing is also to realize that you can - a lot of it comes from just listening
133
593720
5880
09:59
to native speakers or listening to TV shows and movies.
134
599600
4120
10:03
Start paying attention to the use of the prepositions, and especially in writing.
135
603720
6680
10:10
When you're writing, these prepositions, small mistakes can lead to huge misunderstandings,
136
610400
6600
10:17
so make sure you know how to use them correctly.
137
617000
1800
10:18
Now, you can also go to my other channel, www.writetotop.com, you can watch on YouTube.
138
618800
6040
10:24
I do have a few lessons showing you more of these collocations, and it'll help you with
139
624840
4420
10:29
your writing as well.
140
629260
2240
10:31
If you have any questions about these, please ask them in the YouTube comment section or
141
631500
4300
10:35
in the www.engvid.com comments area.
142
635800
5400
10:41
Take the quiz and come back soon, and we'll do this again, and I'll show you some more
143
641200
3880
10:45
interesting collocations like these.
144
645080
2560
10:47
See you then.
145
647640
16000
About this website

This site will introduce you to YouTube videos that are useful for learning English. You will see English lessons taught by top-notch teachers from around the world. Double-click on the English subtitles displayed on each video page to play the video from there. The subtitles scroll in sync with the video playback. If you have any comments or requests, please contact us using this contact form.

https://forms.gle/WvT1wiN1qDtmnspy7