Mousey Prepositions (click for the game board and cards, $1 at TPT)
This is a game that was inspired by my mother's response to my seventh grade struggles with an ELA test that required me to memorize all the prepositions of place. She told me that learning prepositions is easy, they are everything a mouse can do to a box. A mouse can go up a box, down a box, around a box, in a box..... I got an A on the test and have never forgotten that a preposition is everything a mouse can do to a box since (or that Lincoln is the capital of Nebraska because he had big knees but he never went to Nebraska--thanks, Mom!).
To set up the game I printed the game board and cards, grabbed some things to mark their spot with and a number cube (you could use a coin and make heads 1 and tails 2 to make the game take longer), cut a hole in both sides of a box and purchased some toy mice (cat toys). The play is simple: a student draws a card, demonstrates the preposition using the mouse and the box, and if correct rolls (or flips) and moves his/her piece on the board. The first student to reach the finish square is the winner.
Buggy Prepositions (click for the game, $0.50 at TPT)
This game was inspired by a gift I received of plastic insects and my students' fascination with all things bugs at that time. The basic idea is that you divide students into groups of four and give each group an insect and a set of cards (half the cards have nouns and half have prepositions, I suggest printing the nouns on one color of paper and the prepositions on a different for easy sorting). On each student's turn he/she will draw a noun card and a preposition card. The student must then make his/her insect demonstrate the chosen preposition with the selected noun (all classroom objects), earning one point for a successful attempt. This game gets students up and moving all over the classroom. They love it but if you are not ok with a little chaos and noise it's probably not for you.
Preposition Pictionary
This game is just what it sounds like:playing Pictionary with prepositions. I've done this several ways but the kids' favorite is when we have ten or fewer students and we play as a whole class. I have a pile of cards with prepositions on them (I use the cards from one of the two games above) and then provide either whiteboards and markers or the smart board and pen. The first student comes, finds out what preposition they are to get everyone to say by drawing, and starts to draw. I time how long it takes for someone to guess the correct preposition. Whoever guesses correctly first gets a point and I record the time. The correct guesser gets to be the next artist. When the game is finished I give out a prize of some kind (usually a school pride card) to the person with the most points and the person with the fastest time. We've been playing it for two days now and today the students asked if they could play it on their own when they finished their assignment.
Preposition Scavenger Hunt
This is an activity that I briefly mentioned in a previous blog post entitled New Student Made Displays. This activity requires magazines and a list of prepositions. I usually provide the students with about ten different prepositions. They then must find a picture that represents each preposition, cut it out, glue it on their poster and write a sentence about the picture using the preposition. It's a lot of fun to see what students come up with and how they "illustrate" each preposition. We haven't gotten to this activity yet this year (it's planned for next week) but I'm looking forward to seeing what this group of students come up with!