Phrasal Verbs

Syllabus tag: Kenya CBC | Grade 9 English | Theme 12.0 Personal Grooming | Strand 12.3 Grammar | Sub-Strand 12.3.1 Phrasal Verbs (2 Lessons)

Lesson objectives

By the end of this sub-strand, you should be able to:

• Identify phrasal verbs in sentences.
• Explain the meanings of common phrasal verbs.
• Use phrasal verbs correctly, observing separability.
• Appreciate the difference in register between phrasal verbs and single-word equivalents.

Summary

A phrasal verb is a verb combined with a particle, which is a preposition or adverb, forming a unit with a meaning of its own. Put on, take off, get up and look after are phrasal verbs. The difficulty for learners is that the meaning is usually not predictable from the parts: give up has nothing to do with giving. The second difficulty is word order, since some phrasal verbs can be split by their object and others cannot.