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I have an advanced intermediate student who is having a tough time learning the proper use of prepositions (of, with, for, by, to). For example, he will say "I tried hard for pass the test" or "I could not find the cause for that problem." I can´t find a rule anywhere that would make this easier for him and it seems awfully hard to just memorize which preposition applies to each specific verb (depend on, suffer from, accuse of, etc.). Does anyone know a rule or pattern that might help?

Thank you!

Sadly, there are no rules for many. They just appear as set phrases.

look forwart TO
depend ON

If you have Micheal Swan's Practical English Usage, you'll be ahead of the game. The ESL Miscellany also has good lists, including several for this purpose.

A VERY GENERAL rule to follow for "to" and "for" is that to indicates a direction (give this TO her, go TO the beach) while for implies a reason (he bought this FOR them...maybe because it was their anniversary, I went to the store FOR some milk...because I needed to buy it).