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I've been up since 9:30am this morning attempting to rack my brains about what and how I should teach a class of pre-intermediate's prepositions of place. I am at my wits end. I really don't know what to do. I feel even more upset about this than I do nervous about actually teaching and it's driving me up the wall.

We have to follow a format:

Warmup Activity
Introduce Target Language
- Focus on Target Language e.g. meaning, form & pronunciation
Controlled Practice

The ideas I had were as follows:

In order to start off, I would split students into groups to discuss places in the city e.g. bank, pub, library...etc, for about a minute.

I would then call them back and explain the rules of the game, stating that I would describe a location without actually using the word and students would need to buzz in in their groups to answer the question. Team with the most points wins.

I was then thinking of diving into an inductive presentation whereby I would elicit from the students a story about a man who doesn't know how to get to a particular location e.g. a bank. My target language would be "where is the [location]?" and then I would launch into a worksheet.

Worksheet would contain a map of places - some from the warmup - and a list of prepositions. And then statements underneath - a gap fill exercise.

Now I know gap fills test form but I'm really struggling because obviously, I haven't used my target language really, which are the prepositions until this exercise.

I really don't know what to do. I don't know how I would test meaning in conjunction with form. Is the warmup exercise useless?

I really need some ideas. I teach on Tuesday and I'm really desperate as I don't want to fail.

It seems rather strange to do a lesson on prepositions of position for Pre-Intermediate adults (and I'm surprised your course doesn't give you more help), but if that's the situation here are my articles and worksheets on the topic:
http://www.tefl.net/alexcase/worksheets ... /position/

As I said, this is mainly a topic for young learners and so you might need to adapt to make age-appropriate. The Invisible Pen game described in the realia article works well with all ages though.

Prepositions of position worksheets mentioned above now moved to here:
http://tefltastic.wordpress.com/workshe ... /position/

Bit too late for that, I guess, but I think you're making your life too difficult. I would use good old Murphy's Essential Grammar in Use, his explanations and exercises, and then worksheets on the topic from Reward Resource Pack Beginner/Elementary/Pre-Int. Then just take anything you happen to have, mobile phone, marker, whatever, and put it under/on/behind/next to/in front of/above the desk, and ask your students repeatedly Where is the marker now? They can then practice in pairs.
Martin, LiveTEFL/SPEVACEK

I'm in a similar situation, got my first lesson with beginnger adults tomorrow, only 3, so a very small class. What would be a good topuic to teach first time? Thanks

Hello,
I would try to focus on introductions - name, coutry of origin, place where you live, family, age, job. A short model text that the students use to talk about themselves. Drills of basic phrases - How are you?, What's your name?, etc. Make sure you have a pen and paper to draw if they don't understand.
Good luck,
Martin