Using English Prepositions - Lesson 6: During, Over, Throughout - Part 1 (time)

Do you watch TV first thing in the morning?

Maybe you watch more TV at night.

Does the amount of TV you watch depend on the time of day

or the time of the year it is?

For my son, it does.

I'll let you listen and find out

when he watches the most TV.

In this family we like TV.

But...do you watch TV during the school year?

No, but...

Well, a little bit, right?

Yes.

Do you watch TV during the summer?

Yes.

When do you watch more TV?

During the school year, I don't watch much,

but during the summer I watch more.

Yeah. Sometimes we watch too much.

Um, do I let you watch TV at breakfast?

Only if it's summer.

Yes. Only in the summer.

My son watches more TV in the summer.

That's because he's on summer vacation,

so he has more time.

Well, we all know that watching too much TV is not a good thing.

So what sounds worse?

Watching TV during the summer

or watching TV throughout the summer?

Throughout the summer is likely worse

because this preposition "throughout"

emphasizes the whole period,

from beginning to end, the whole time.

"During" could also emphasize a whole period,

but often we use "during"

to refer to amounts of time within a period

or some points of time within a period.

Here's another example.

I might...or I do ask my children

to use good manners throughout dinner.

From beginning to end, I want them to use their table manners.

Now, during dinner they usually tell me about their day.

So are they talking about their day the whole time?

Not necessarily.

But at some point while were having dinner

they tell me about their day.

Consider these other examples.

At school a teacher might say:

At a concert they may announce:

At work you're told:

And at some award ceremony

someone might say:

What about talking with someone over dinner?

What does that mean?

"Over" is similar to "during."

Over lunch, over dinner, over any meal

means something takes place while you eat.

So I could suggest:

I'm suggesting that we meet,

we eat lunch together,

and while we're eating, we'll talk about the trip.

"Over" can also be used with amounts of time.

"Over" is often used with amounts or periods of time

in the future or the past:

Have you been studying grammar with me

over the past few days or weeks?

I hope so.

Here's another example.

Relatives might visit me this weekend.

They'll visit over the weekend.

They'll be here Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Over the weekend.

I wonder if they expect me

to entertain them throughout the weekend.

I have some work to do, so I hope not.

"Throughout the weekend" means the whole time.

Friday, Saturday, Sunday...they expect me to entertain them.

So there's over the weekend,

and throughout the weekend - the whole time.

So we've learned about OVER, THROUGHOUT, and DURING.

Which of these prepositions would I likely choose

to complete this question?

Well, we did just talk about using "over"

before a meal.

So I could ask:

This means that I'm inviting you to have dinner with me

so that we can talk.

Are there any other prepositions we could use in this question?

How about "during"?

Would you like to discuss this during dinner?

Sure that works. It's grammatically correct.

The meaning might be a little different.

This question sounds like it's already established

that we eat dinner together.

There's one more preposition that could work.

We didn't see it yet in this lesson.

We could ask:

"At" simply answers the question WHEN?

We'll talk more about this preposition in the next part of our lesson.