Hey! What's up! And welcome to Series English! My name is Antonia Romaker
and today we'll talk about the prepositions 'at', 'on' and 'in' in terms of time.
Actually to tell you the truth there is a very good method to differentiate these prepositions,
it is called a triangle method or a pyramid method.
It doesn't matter how you call it, the logic is still the same and it is very simple.
At the top of the triangle there is 'at', because it is connected with the shortest periods of time:
hours, when you talk about exact time, for example
at five p.m., at twelve o'clock, at seven thirty and so on.
Below we can see the preposition 'on', it is connected with some longer periods of time like days.
You can say on Friday, on my birthday, on the 9th of May.
And finally at the bottom we have 'in' because it is connected with long periods of time,
some of them are really really long: weeks, months, years, decades, centuries, seasons.
Well seasons should be somewhere between months and years, anyway.
In two weeks, in July, in February, in 1987, in the 80s, in the 1900s.
Notice, that I have put an asterisk here, that's because when you use such phrases
like 'in two weeks', 'in two days', 'in three hours', 'in five minutes',
usually you mean that something is going to happen when this period of time has finished.
Let's say: 'I will meet you in two weeks'.
It means that now let's say I'm heading to London and I'm going to be back
when two weeks have passed, after two weeks.
However in July means in July, during this period of time, the whole month, someday we'll meet.
Let's say we'll meet in July.
I'm not sure when exactly, on the first, on the 31st, but we'll meet in July.
Or I was born in 1987, in that year, I do not talk about some particular date.
On the 8th of April, then 'on', because here we talk about the day.
Notice that when we talk about some parts of the day we'll use the preposition 'in',
so we say in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening - well most of the time.
However there is the phrase at night, at midday, at the weekend.
And now let's compare at and on. When we talk about public holidays or weekends
mainly we use at, but when we mean a particular special day or a weekend then we are supposed to use on.
We never travel at the New Year the prices go through the roof, they fly up, crazy!
So at the New Year, in general, I speak in general.
Here on New Year's Day the whole family gets together. Yeah I mean this special day, the New Year's Day.
At the weekend I usually go hiking.
Our school reunion usually takes place on the last weekend of February. Or is it the first?
Unfortunately here the triangle logic does not apply.
And finally let's compare in and on separately. When we deal with mornings, afternoons and evenings,
we use in most of the time in the morning, in the afternoon, in the evening.
But when we talk about some specific morning, afternoon or evening we are supposed to use on.
Two examples here. On the morning of the 9th of November.
Here you name the date, you give some additional information, that's why on.
On a beautiful summer's evening, once again you give some extra information
And I'll see you in the morning, even though I propose a specific morning - tomorrow,
still we say in the morning, because this is speaking in general nothing very specific about it.
and here we have some extra information.
There is also the phrase 'in the night', generally we say at night most of the time,
but we can say in the night once again when we talk about
and we want to sound a little bit sophisticated and poetic.
I was awake in the night thinking about how I could turn my life around.
OK, that's it for today!
I hope that now you're not so confused about these prepositions - at, on, in in terms of time.
We'll talk about location in a separate video.
If have any questions as usual write a comment and do not forget to like, share and subscribe!
I hope to see you soon! Happy English and Russian practice! Bye!