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General rules regarding prepositions

March 23, 2016 pdf

Use ‘in’ for countries and big towns.

  • She was born in New Zealand.
  • I live in Mumbai.

Use ‘at’ for addresses.

  • Are you still at that address?
    We live at D 23, MG Road.

Use ‘in’ for position inside a three dimensional space.

  • The cat is in the kitchen.

Use ‘on’ for position on the surface of something.

  • There is something on the roof.
  • Put the books on the table.

Use ‘to’ and ‘into’ to show direction.

  • He went to work.
  • The child fell into the well.

Use ‘till’ to indicate time.

  • I waited till 6 o’clock.

Use ‘since’ to indicate the starting point of something.

  • I have been waiting since morning.

Use ‘for’ to indicate duration.

  • It rained for two hours.
  • We have been living in this city for three years.

Use ‘from’ to indicate the source.

  • She comes from a small town.

Use ‘to’ to indicate the destination.

  • He went to America.

Use ‘between’ to indicate position between two or more clearly defined people or objects.

  • The child sat between his father and parents.

Use ‘among’ to indicate position among more than two people or objects.

  • She sat among the children.

Use ‘with’ to indicate the instrument and ‘by’ to indicate the agent.

  • He killed the spider with a stone.
  • The spider was killed by the boy.

Use ‘beside’ to mean ‘by the side of’.

  • The boy sat beside his mother.

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