5 exercises — practising at, on, in, by, for, and during with sprint planning, standups, and deployment schedules.
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
The deployment is scheduled _____ midnight to minimise user impact. Which preposition is correct?
Use "at" with specific clock times and precise points in time: at midnight, at 3:00 AM, at noon, at the end of the sprint. "In" is used with longer periods (in the morning, in Q3, in the sprint). "On" is used with days and dates (on Monday, on 15 June). "By midnight" would mean "no later than midnight" — a deadline, not a scheduled moment. Always use "at" when referring to a clock time or a precise time marker.
2 / 5
We will review the pull requests _____ Monday's standup. Which preposition is correct?
"During" means "within the time span of" an event or period, making it correct for activities that happen inside a named event like a meeting. "During Monday's standup" = within the standup meeting on Monday. "At Monday's standup" is also common in spoken English and technically acceptable, but "during" more precisely conveys that the review happens as part of the meeting. "On" is used with days alone ("on Monday"), not with named events. "In" is used for longer time periods.
3 / 5
The bug fix must be merged _____ Friday or we miss the release window. Which preposition expresses a deadline?
"By" expresses a deadline — the action must be completed no later than the stated time. "By Friday" means "at some point before Friday ends". This is essential vocabulary for sprint planning and release management. "On Friday" means the action happens on that specific day (no urgency implied). "At Friday" is incorrect. "In Friday" is incorrect — "in" is used with months, years, or periods (in June, in 2024, in the sprint), not with days.
4 / 5
The senior engineer has been working _____ this refactor _____ three weeks. Which preposition pair is correct?
"Working on" is the correct collocation — you work on a task, project, or refactor. "For" expresses a duration of time (for three weeks, for two hours, for six months). "Since" is used with a starting point in time ("since January", "since Monday"), not with a duration. "In" and "at" do not collocate with "working" in this context. The phrase "has been working on X for Y" is a standard present-perfect progressive pattern for ongoing work.
5 / 5
The team completed 34 story points _____ the last sprint. Which preposition is correct?
Use "in" with defined periods of time such as sprints, quarters, months, and years: in the last sprint, in Q2, in 2024, in the last release cycle. "During" is also possible ("during the last sprint") and equally correct — both "in" and "during" work with named time periods. However, "in" is slightly more idiomatic in Agile and project-management English when referring to sprints and iterations. "At" and "on" are incorrect here because they are used for points in time, not periods.