Text 7. How to introduce Phrasal Verbs

A Phrasal Verb is a phrase which consists of a verb in combination with a preposition or adverb or both, the meaning of which is different from the meaning of its separate parts: ‘look after’, ‘work out’ and ‘make up for’ are all phrasal verbs (Koprowski, 2005).

Andrzej Cirocki, a proponent of the ‘text/ context method’, has a useful approach to teach phrasal verbs. He states that if we aim at teaching a few Phrasal Verbs to our students, we should present them in many different real contexts so as to enable them to deduce their exact meaning and to see whether they are transitive or intransitive, separable or inseparable. All these items can be noticed by the students if Phrasal Verbs are presented in authentic contexts (Cirocki, 2003). In his article ‘Teaching Phrasal Verbs my Means of Constructing Texts’ Cirocki explains his approach in the following way; asking students to read a text entitled 'Hotel Blaze Escape Drama' in which a few Phrasal Verbs can be spotted.

HOTEL BLAZE ESCAPE DRAMA

At present it is not known how the fire started. It seems the fire, broke out in the early hours of the morning. The fire alarm went off at around 2.00 a.m. It is thought it was set off by smoke coming from one of the bedrooms on the first floor. The fire spread quickly from the first floor to the second floor. The fire brigade were called in immediately and fire fighters were on the scene within 15 minutes, but by this time the hotel was already in flames. They fought the blaze and managed to get it under control, though it took them to hours to put the fire out.

Through this method students are able to acquire phrasal verbs better because it is more productive and easier to learn phrasal verbs from a context.

While reading 'Hotel Blaze Escape Drama' students get to know new Phrasal Verbs whose meaning and function are explained in the context. Thus, they can be learnt in a natural way. The text constitutes a kind of a background for the new Phrasal Verbs and has been formed to serve as a context, through which new Phrasal Verbs can be presented and explained. However, this is not a genuinely authentic context. Having read such a text, the meaning of these Phrasal Verbs should be clear. If it is not, we should provide students with other contexts so that they could guess the meaning, which makes students remember new Phrasal Verbs much better. Not until then, could they make use of Phrasal Verbs in their own texts (Cirocki, 2003).

(Source: Cagri Tugrul Mart. How to Teach Phrasal Verbs (2012). English Language Teaching Vol. 5, No. 6, 114-118.)