Prepositions By For and To English Grammar for Beginners

uh we’re going to begin today with

bi by talking about buy the preposition

bye so i have a few different ways i’m

going to speak a little more

slowly now too so uh

this uh i have a few different

groups so a few different uses of the

word

buy first let’s look at how we use

buy to mean near so buy

[Music]

so this is how we use buy with a

location all right i think youtube has

joined us fantastic

sorry for the technical issues youtube

hi everybody

okay your perfect time and perfect time

in youtube so we’re going to talk about

buy we’re just beginning okay so when we

use

buy it looks like this buy the desk

or buy my house or buy

your drink or buy a park so you’ll

notice

in each of these we use by

followed by a location so this can mean

like a city yes or a place

in your community it can also mean

something that moves

so for example here buy your drink or

buy a park uh well parks don’t move but

like

something that’s not like this is the

this is a good example buy your drink

something that moves so we use by

plus location to mean near so lots of

people ask me so what’s the difference

between

by the desk and near the desk really

nothing

in terms of meaning but to me near just

sounds a little bit

more formal okay we tend to use bi

a little bit more in everyday speech so

this is

a one use of buy for today’s lesson i

want to focus

a lot on these two uses

of the preposition by so

why why because many learners

uh make mistakes with these two points

right here

with these two uses of five the first

use of buy

is to uh is sorry this one is with

buy plus a point in time

to express a deadline so a deadline

means the point in time

by which you have to finish something

or something is going to complete

so for example by tomorrow

or by november or

by 3 p.m or

by spring by this time next year

so these all express deadlines

at some point in the future

something is going to happen or

something is going to finish

the problem with this preposition for

many learners

is that many people like to use until

we cannot use until in this way

to create a deadline it’s incorrect like

until tomorrow

we use until to talk about continuing

actions that will

stop at a certain point in time

here we have we’re marking a deadline

we’re not talking about a continuing

action here so please keep this point

in mind if you have questions or example

sentences please send them

in the chat and i will try to check in

real time everyone saying hi

great oh also if you have not already

please make sure to like and share the

video so others can find it we have all

the technical issues

fixed okay so this is uh the first use

of buy i taught a lesson uh on you

there’s a youtube lesson

available about by and until that i

taught

i’ll put a link to that in the

description the youtube description so

you can check the differences

after this lesson okay let’s go to this

next one this is the other point i

really want to focus on uh for this

week’s lesson

uh by plus some like

data point for example number a number

or a time period or percentage

this is a percent mark we use by

plus data point to express

the amount of change so how much

something changed this is really

important

uh we’re going to see kind of the

opposite sort sort of uh

version later with a different

preposition

in today’s lesson so let’s look at these

let’s look at these three example

sentences

the price increased by 100

so the price increase by 100 means

there was a base price for example

the regular price was 10

then the price increased by 100

means the new price is 110

so this is showing how much

something changed and

this verb right here tells us

what kind of change so the price

increased by 100 let’s compare this to

this one the second one here support

dropped by 30

support dropped by 30 percent

this so dropped this dropped this is the

past tense

of the verb drop to drop to go down very

suddenly yeah

so support dropped by 30

so this buy tells us how much

change there was so not 10 percent or 20

but 30 this tells us

the degree the amount of the change

okay uh finally

life expectancy improved

by five years life expectancy improved

by five years so life expectancy

means how long we expect

to live so 80 years or 60 years or 70

years

life expectancy improved so that means

it went up

it got better by five years so that

means if life expectancy was

70 years it sorry the light life

expectancy was 70 years

it went up by five years

so we use by to talk about the amount of

change of something this is different

from two which i’m going to talk about

later okay some questions are coming uh

zergio on youtube says dropped is

similar to

fallen uh yes just be careful of the

grammar

so support fell by 30 yes you can say

fell or decreased like i said drop

sounds like very suddenly like when you

drop

an object it’s very sudden right so

drop communicates that sudden uh

feeling okay uh

all right nadeur on facebook says the

raw activity concentrate

increased by two percent so you’ll

notice

these are all past tense yeah

so we tend to use this kind of

change thing with future tense

or past tense like to report

something in the past or to predict

something in the future

so please keep your verbs in mind your

verb tense

okay i don’t see other questions so i’ll

go to the last part for this

uh common expressions with bi common

expressions with five

so uh these are not like uh rules

necessarily like these

but they are important uh things to know

important phrases by the way

by the way i think a lot of you know by

the way

it’s just when something when a new idea

that’s

related to that similar to your topic of

conversation

comes to your mind you can say by the

way to introduce that

like it’s not the main topic but

you want to bring it up you want to talk

about something in your conversation

or in an email by the way you can use

that to introduce

to change between your topics so if

you’re writing an email for example

and your email is about a meeting you’re

like okay so the meeting is at 3 p.m

today right

by the way do you want to get lunch

today so it’s like

it’s something that’s sort of not the

main topic

but you want to ask anyway you want to

introduce it anyway

all right cool uh so the next two

uh are actually kind of a pair a set

this is a pattern you can follow

it is day by day i chose here sorry i

erased the y

day by day or hour by hour

or minute by minute or month by month

whatever

you can choose what period or

uh yeah to put in this pattern

this expresses a gradual change

like day by day his english improved

or hour by hour she got more and more

nervous

so it’s saying something is gradually

changing

in this like time period

so with each day or with each hour

something gradually

changes we can use day by day hour by

hour this

time by time pattern to do that

finally stop by i have only stopped by

here but we have lots and lots and lots

and lots of phrasal verbs

that use by someone on youtube just

wrote can i say i saw someone passed by

my house yes

someone passed by my house so to stop

by or to pass by or to drop by and so on

these are phrasal verbs relating to

movement

so stop by means to quickly

stop at a location just for a few

minutes like stop by

the store stop by your house and so on

pass by means to pass something near it

so in the facebook example to drop by

again with drop sounds like you quickly

go someplace and leave so buy

is often used in these kinds of movement

related phrasal verbs with these stop

and drop

go as well okay so this is our first

preposition for today the preposition

bye

bye uh someone says what about by

the time we use it in past perfect i

think yeah yeah yeah so that’s

similar to this one right here by point

in time

like by the time i graduated i had

something something something

yes we can use uh buy and that way too

so we use by to refer to points in time

in these examples i talked about future

examples when we express

deadlines but yes we can use it

to talk about uh past past points too

all right so that’s our first

preposition for today how exciting

all right uh i’m looking for your

examples

uh many of you are writing uh day by day

blah blah blah blah yes that’s correct

that’s correct janalis

on youtube um i only stopped by to say

hi to alicia

that’s funny okay how about standby yes

standby means wait

to wait or in the expression stand

by someone like stand by me or stand by

her

it means support someone to show support

for someone

all right let’s finish up by

if you’re just joining uh thanks very

much for joining us today’s

topic is prepositions we’re talking

about prepositions by

four and two in today’s lesson uh

i just talked about the preposition by

now we’re going to go to four also

uh we had some technical difficulties

earlier so i couldn’t talk about it

as much as i wanted to but there is free

stuff as always for you from the links

below the video if you’re watching on

youtube or above the video

if you’re watching on facebook so all of

these

uh yes i know i show them to you a lot

but

each of these vocabulary and expression

pdfs to download they’re about specific

topics yes but inside

each of these you’ll find these

prepositions used

everywhere so here’s an example uh this

one’s the around town conversation one

for example here’s one we’re going to

talk about later today how do i get

to the and so on so

there are if you download like i don’t

know several of these a group of these

and look for today’s prepositions i

think that’s a good way to practice

studying how to use them naturally

because it’s kind of difficult to just

try to keep the like a set you know two

or

by pattern in your head it’s good to

practice these

naturally all right uh

let’s continue on i will show you

today’s lesson boards again

now that we’re all here uh today’s

lesson boards look like this we

just talked about the preposition by

now we’re going to talk about the

preposition four

lastly today we will talk about two so

we have lots to do

let’s continue to four part two today

all right also if you have not please

make sure to like and share the video

so that other people can find today’s

lesson

okay uh where is four there it is let’s

talk about

the preposition four now when do we use

the preposition

four there are a few situations

so four let’s shift our brains

to four uh four

so we can use for to express

a purpose to express a purpose so what

does this mean

we can use it in two really two

main patterns first is

4 plus a verb in the ing

form or this is hard to see isn’t it

4 plus a noun

phrase 4 plus a noun phrase so choose 1.

you can’t use both you cannot use both

uh well in a couple specific cases

i’ll share with you so for

in this way expresses a purpose like a

reason

for something so let’s look at some

examples what am i talking about

what do i mean so for cooking

so this is a verb in the ing form like

for example

i need this ingredient for cooking or i

need

this thing for cooking so we are

expressing

some like need or some purpose for an

object or so on

for lunch maybe you’ve heard this we can

use this for meals and so on

so i ate something for lunch so we can

imagine that is meaning

for the purpose of lunch yeah or for

my homework i need to study this for

my homework so expressing purpose

again or for reference i included this

because this is a really really good one

uh that you will probably see

i use this in my lessons a lot something

for

reference means something for you

like extra for you to know for you to

check later for reference for reference

so

for reference and then we give some

extra information

this is a very common pattern so keep an

eye out for it i use this a lot actually

for reference

other examples for cleaning so this is

that verb in the ing

form another really common one is for

fun

for fun like uh i’m going to

go to the beach for fun meaning for the

purpose

of fun so all of these

express some kind of purpose

we can use either pattern we cannot say

for funing

so please remember these two we cannot

use them together we cannot mix them

verb in the ing form cooking cleaning

or a noun phrase a noun phrase so this

expresses

a purpose okay onward

i don’t see other questions

sorry i said your name wrong on facebook

says i need oil for

cooking perfect nadoor says i will have

a break for

lunch perfect kuna says we do it

we just do it for fun perfect perfect

okay everybody is crushing it very nice

ooh guillermo has a great question on

youtube guillermo says

what’s the difference between i bought

this pan for cooking

and i bought this pan to cook there’s no

difference they’re both fine

uh i bought i would say though like and

when i say there’s no difference i mean

they communicate the same idea

uh i think i bought this pan for cooking

sounds like generally more natural your

second pattern i bought this pan

to cook is it sounds like uh we’re going

to hear the

end of that i bought this pan to cook

fish

or i bought this pan to cook rice

something like that i feel

like that’s maybe a situation we would

use

the second pattern but they communicate

the same idea

all right let’s go to the second part of

four here this one is 4

plus a length of time a length

of time not a point in time a length of

time

this expresses the duration

of an action or condition the duration

of an action or condition

that means how long did something happen

or

how long did a condition happen or

continue for example for two hours

for three months for a week

for 10 years for a second

for 30 minutes all of these

are lengths of time please note

these hours months years

and minutes these are plural yeah

for a week yes this is

one week but it’s still a length of time

right

seven days same thing here for a

second it’s still a length of time

so please remember uh please keep in

mind

your countable and your uncountable

nouns

here so uh this expression for

a second you might hear this when

someone wants your attention

very very briefly like hey can i talk to

you for a second

it doesn’t mean literally one second it

means very quickly can i talk to you for

a second

you might also hear can i talk to you

for a sec

can i talk to you for a sec which means

for a very

short period of time okay

uh so some questions are coming in

evelyn says my class is for two hours is

it correct

that is not correct unfortunately no so

when we talk about the duration of an

action or condition

we often use this to like to like i said

before to make a report

so we’re talking about uh something that

has finished

or something uh that come that’s coming

up for example

so i studied for two hours

is correct uh in your example sentence

my class is two hours long

so in that case we’re talking about like

a statement

of fact yeah so this is a pattern

we often see with a present perfect

and past perfect tense

also with a future tense as well too

okay um some other examples are coming

in

uh ditros i hope i said your name right

on facebook says i learned english for

two years very nice very nice

um okay i don’t see others yet

many of you are talking about your

english study experience

then let’s finish four wow time went

quick

let’s finish this with a few common

expressions about

four so the first one here is for a

while

you might have seen this i’ve had some

seen some questions about this

actually so for a while what does for a

while mean

like it follows this pattern but what’s

a while

for a while means an unspecified

duration

that means we don’t know how long so

like let’s go shopping

for a while or let’s uh let’s relax

for a while it means we don’t have a

plan

for how long just let’s do it

and then we’ll decide when to change

or when to stop okay

another one that’s very common for now

for now so what does that mean for now

that’s not a

duration now is not a duration right for

now

is what you use when you don’t want to

make

like a final decision about something

so for example you go to a cafe

and you want to eat but

you haven’t decided yet so you say for

now a coffee

for now just a coffee which means at

this time

just at this time a coffee so for now

sounds like in the future you want to do

something else or something else is

going to happen

but at this point just this

so for now just a coffee for now

just the preposition four we’re not

going to talk about the others now

okay uh quickly then these last ones i

included a few phrasal verbs uh that i

talk about

a lot actually on this channel so to go

for

a meal like to go for lunch to go for

dinner to go for a drink

as well is okay means to go

out in order to have that to go

out to eat breakfast to go out to eat

lunch to go out to eat dinner

so that means not eating at your home so

to go

for a meal to look

for to look for we use this to mean uh

to search like to look for a new

apartment

or to look for a new job so

to search is what look for means what’s

the difference between look for in

search look for is more commonly used in

everyday conversation finally

to work for to work for

so this means to be employed to be

employed at a company so to work for

apple to work for google means to be

employed at apple to be employed at

google it’s just

another way to say that we use work for

in everyday conversation employed you

might see on like contracts and official

documents and so on

all right time has gone quick so i’m

gonna finish

four with that point okay

uh raquel says i work for my husband’s

company perfect perfect

uh alexander has a question on facebook

look for

can be used for something and someone

yes

look for so i’m looking for my friend

or i’m looking for my mom or i’m looking

for my coffee

you can use it for people and for

objects yes thanks for that question

uh okay i’m looking for your questions

but i don’t see any i see lots of great

example sentences though

someone says i’m looking for a second

chance good or i’m looking for

a lesson very nice okay we need to

continue to the last preposition

today because uh time’s going quick i’ll

show you again

uh some free stuff real quick you can

get i’ll show you another preposition

example

uh we were talking about food weren’t we

we’re talking about cooking and food

so uh let’s see where’s a good one

there are lots of them oh my gosh it’s

noisy

so i’ll show you a couple more of these

and you can choose

whichever topic you like here’s a nice

one there’s a lot

uh about hobbies i feel like i haven’t

shown you this one in a while this one’s

about music you can check this out

some phrases on the back uh here’s one

we’re about to talk about this

preposition

right here do you want to go to karaoke

so nice little segue nice little

transition

so pick up these uh all these are for

free from the link below the video if

you’re watching on youtube or above the

video

if you are watching on facebook so i’ll

show you

again our boards for today very quickly

this is what we are talking about in

today’s lesson

i just talked about by we just finished

four now lastly we are going to talk

about

two hooray very exciting so let’s get to

it

let’s get to it oh my gosh okay uh

if you have not as well please do make

sure to like and share the video so

other people can find today’s lesson

that would be awesome all right onward

two the preposition two many uses oh my

gosh look at them all

so let’s talk about them let’s talk

about two

two plus a destination

a destination marks movement

movement so i just said let’s go to the

last part

so the last part is my destination

so destination means your final goal

like the

final place you want to move yeah for

example

go to bed so your bed is the destination

or drive to the store that’s your

destination

mail to him so you’ll notice destination

a destination

can be a person this is when we are like

sending something or mailing something

yeah

so the verb is important to use right

we can also use it with go like go to

him or go to her

which means to move to that person

past tense example went to canada went

to canada send to me

or wave to her i included this example

sentence

because i want to talk about a very

interesting

preposition choice that you can use and

the native speakers use

all the time to communicate an

interesting little nuance

wave to her wave to her so that means

you see your friend on the street

and you wave to your friend so it’s like

you send her

a wave kind of that’s sort of the

feeling yeah you go like this

your friend also waves they see you and

they wave

but sometimes you’ll see

someone use at instead of

two why is that so like this wave at her

you might also hear different verbs like

talk at

someone instead of talk to someone it’s

like what does that mean

the difference here between at and two

is when we use at in a case like this

like wave at her

it’s like we don’t expect the other

person

to respond or maybe the other person

doesn’t

realize we’re waving or talking or it’s

just

it’s just a one-way situation to

communicate that

we change the preposition here to at so

wave at

her or like to talk at someone it just

sounds like

the other person isn’t listening really

so

you might hear this preposition changing

to

that okay so an interesting little point

uh okay onward walk to school is another

one

the final point i want to talk about is

this i have it marked with an x

so that means please don’t do this two

there

two there for example uh i went to there

or i go to there every day we do not

use to with there because

there is not a destination it’s not a

specific location

all of these bed canada school

the store it’s a specific place

there is not so we do not use

to there with these patterns okay

on to the next part because time is

going quickly

two plus limit

expresses a maximum or a minimum

oh my gosh time’s going quick but this

is important if you watch the beginning

of this lesson i talked about

by this is used in the same position

as buy but it communicates a different

idea

two plus limit the price increased to

100 that means the price

increased the new price is 100

that’s the new top price the new like

maximum

another example efficiency dropped to

20 so this is not the amount of change

it’s talking about the new level the new

final position of something

efficiency dropped to 20

efficiency the books

were stacked to the roof that means

until

the roof the books were stacked so we’re

expressing

some kind of limit a maximum or like a

new minimum

we use 2 plus our limit

in this case data points or a physical

limit

like the roof is the frame of the video

so we use

two to express these ideas in this way

okay real quick because oh my gosh

i have no time the last two points for

two

to show a relationship as in this is

important

to me or please respond

to her message please respond to her

message

so this use of two shows a relationship

between uh things

the final point for today hopefully an

easy one

is to show time and time periods like

i work 9 2 five from nine

two five or the movie is eight

to nine thirty or it’s ten to three

it’s a quarter to one so

these express times are time and time

period related

expression that we use to with

wow that was a lot uh

and i hope that it was all okay i have

to finish

uh or else the team the remote team will

get very upset with me

so uh we’ll finish there for today’s

lesson

as i said uh i have taught about many of

these topics before

on the channel so i will share some

links in the youtube description i can’t

change the facebook one so if you’re

watching on facebook please visit

youtube.com englishclass101

i will put some links in the description

so you can check and review

after this live stream uh

and next week’s lesson i’ll be back next

week of course too

uh if you’re new yeah i broadcast we

broadcast

once every week uh you can set a

notification to make sure you always

watch next week i’m going to talk about

basic and reduced adverb clauses

september is going to be a month

of writing practice lessons i’ve decided

so

basic and reduced adverb clauses for

example

while i was teaching this lesson versus

while teaching this lesson

so what is that like how do we do that

how do we make them smaller we’re going

to talk about this

next week so please join me alright i

have to finish there i am very late so

thank you very much for liking and

sharing the video check out your free

stuff

from the link below or above the video

yeah thanks for your cool example

sentences for sharing

all that good stuff enjoy the rest of

your week and i will see you again

next time bye