Phrasal verbs

A phrasal verb is a verb followed by a preposition or an adverb. Its meaning is often different from the meaning of its parts.

Compare the meanings of the verbs gets on and run away in (a) and (b) below. You can easily guess their meanings in (a) but in (b) they have special meanings.

(a) She got on at Agra when the bus stopped for breakfast.

Dev Anand ran away from home when he was a teenager.

In (a) i.e. the first sentence, she got on refers to the movement of a person

Whereas

In the second sentence, it says that Dev Anand ran away i.e. left his house

(b) She’s eager to get on in life. (Succeed)

The visitors ran away with the match. (Won easily)

In (b) i.e. the first sentence, it refers to climbing the ladder of success

Whereas

In the second sentence, it refers to winning the match (ran away with the match)

Some phrasal verbs have three parts: a verb followed by an adverb and a preposition. For Example:

(c) Our car ran out of petrol just outside the city limits.

(d) The government wants to reach out to the people with this new campaign.

B. Now find the sentences in the lesson that have the phrasal verbs given below. Match them with their meanings. (you have already found out the meanings of some of them.) Are their meanings the same as that of their parts? (Note that two parts of the phrasal verb may occur separated in the text.)

(i) plunge in	Speak or write without focus
(ii) kept back	Stay indoors
(iii) move up	Make (them) remain quite
(iv) ramble on	Have a good relationship with
(v) get along with	Give an assignment (homework) to a person in authority (the teacher)
(vi) calm down	Compensate
(vii) stay in	Go straight to the topic
(viii) make up for	Go to the next grade
(ix) hand in	Not promoted