Phrasal Verb Practice Get Away With Something
hello hello welcome to today’s live
English lesson here on the speak English
with Vanessa YouTube channel I’m so glad
that you’re learning English with me and
you’re ready today to learn an important
phrasal verb a more advanced phrasal
verb and to master it I hope by the end
of today’s lesson you’ll feel
comfortable understanding this phrasal
verb and using it yourself because
that’s the goal I want you to be able to
use it yourself if you’re new here
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are a lot of friends here live with me
today we’ve got Yuri in Ukraine Zahir in
Kurdistan Garrick in Venezuela hello
hello thanks for coming Marcia Douglas
good morning Jonathan Wow great we’ve
got friends from Korea Montreal
Western Sahara Egypt Brazil thank you
everyone for joining me I really
appreciate it today I have a question
for you to start our lesson I want to
know which sibling are you sibling means
brother or sister
so I would say I am the oldest sibling I
have one younger sister so I’m the
oldest I want to know for you what’s
your order are you the oldest sibling
are you the youngest sibling are you the
middle sibling or maybe you’re an only
child you don’t have any brothers or
sisters
for me I’m the oldest sibling and I
don’t know what it’s like to be the
youngest sibling because I’ve never
experienced that but my husband Dan he
is the middle sibling so he knows what
it’s like to be the youngest and he
knows also what it’s like to be an older
sibling he’s never been the oldest but
he knows what it’s like to have a
younger sibling his younger sister oh
we’ve got lots of great responses
Teodoro says I’m the youngest sibling
Ahsan says I’m the youngest sibling all
a couple people don’t have any siblings
oh I see the youngest sibling the oldest
sibling the youngest Eileen says I’m the
oldest sibling Sergio says I’m the
middle sibling all right so my follow-up
question is do you think this is using
today’s phrasal verb I want to see if
you can guess what this question means
without much explanation yet do you
think that the oldest sibling
or the middle sibling or the youngest
sibling gets away with more which
sibling gets away with more I’ll give
you a quick example in my family I
always thought that the youngest sibling
my sister I always thought that my
sister got away with more for exam
one time at Christmas my dad gave us
both a little pocket knife a little
knife so that we could go outside and
maybe cut some sticks or make something
outside and I was maybe ten years old
but my sister was seven years old so she
had this experience at a younger age
than me and I thought ah she can get
away with more than me
Oh Adriana says I’m the youngest sibling
and I always got away with more empty
says of course the youngest sibling all
right
can you guess what does this phrasal
verb mean get away with more get away
with more hmm for me as the oldest
sibling I usually had to be more
responsible or my parents wanted me to
be responsible because I needed to be a
good role model for my sister so there
is more pressure on me and I don’t know
in reality what my sisters experience
was like but from my eyes I thought that
she got away with more oh we’ve got some
great definitions here some possible
things to not live with something let’s
take that and just twist it a little bit
Julio I think you’ve got it Julio says
avoid being punished Oh
so typically we say the youngest sibling
can avoid being punished easier then the
oldest sibling I’m going to write a
sentence here and I would like you to
use this sentence in your family so I
want you to say something like I’m the
youngest
I got away with more than my older
brother we’re using a comparison and a
phrasal verb so let me write the
sentence here so that you can have a
good example I would say my sister got
we’re using a past tense here got away
with more than me maybe maybe if she
cried about something my parents maybe
weren’t so upset but if I cried about
something they were more upset in my
eyes of course that might not be the
reality so we’re using got away with and
this means I’ll write our little
definition here avoid being punished so
she didn’t get in trouble as easily as I
did because my parents expected me to be
more responsible I don’t know if it was
really true or if it worked but
typically I think that’s the expectation
oh we’ve got some great sentences here
my brother Fran got away with so much
more than me and my older sister Oh
Sergio sounds like your brother friend
could do anything it didn’t really
matter and your parents just said oh who
cares he got away with a lot more than
his older siblings Regina says in my
case my oldest brother always got away
with more than me oh that’s interesting
so maybe your parents told your older
brother it’s okay don’t worry about it
and then for you they wanted you to be
more responsible do you think this is
because he’s a boy and you’re a girl
or is it just your family circumstance I
think sometimes aged parents treat kids
with who are different ages they treat
them differently or maybe there are
different genders a boy and a girl a son
and a daughter so they treat them
differently and one can get away with
more than the other I used to be the
only one who got away with everything in
my family
Oh Richard so you could do anything you
could avoid being punished oh I really
says I don’t think that one of my
siblings got away with more so your
parents were pretty even they didn’t
treat one sibling with more harshness
than the other and this doesn’t need to
be too strong so in my family I think it
wasn’t so strong my parents didn’t tell
my sister you can do anything but from
my childhood perspective I felt like
that so it wasn’t too strong in reality
Laura says I’m the youngest and I get
away with more than my siblings hmm a
lot of people here are saying that the
youngest hacia says this too
parents tend to show partiality in favor
of younger siblings parents tend to let
the younger siblings get away with more
and just from my quick theory maybe it’s
because they have already experienced a
lot with the older sibling and they
don’t have the energy or they don’t
maybe want to be as strict with the
youngest or they want the oldest to just
be a good role model so if you’re the
oldest you might have experienced the
same thing as me Betty says I’m so
jealous because my sister got away with
more than me maybe you felt like it’s
not fair so let’s quickly take a look at
this and you’ll probably have
noticed already that this phrasal verb
always sticks together we need this to
stick together and you can’t say got
away more with me uh we need to keep it
together it’s like glue got away with
more than me so in your family one
sibling got away with more than another
sibling so let’s try to use this in also
maybe more advanced way so this is the
basic meaning the basic meaning is that
you can avoid punishment but what about
what if we change punishment to be just
something something negative maybe avoid
criticism or avoid some negative
feelings let me write a sentence for you
and I want to see if you can also take
this to the next level maybe you’ve
experienced this in your workplace you
could say my coworker it’s really
annoying my co-worker tries to get away
with doing minimal work oh it’s so
annoying because you’re trying to do a
good job and then maybe you have to do
more work because they are trying to get
away with doing minimal work so here
they’re they’re trying to avoid Smitty
it’s not punishment but they’re trying
to sneak you can imagine some kind of
hidden action they’re trying to get away
with doing
in less work then maybe they should be
doing they’re trying to get away with
doing minimal work and in this situation
it’s a similar idea same thing as trying
to go around some rules do something a
little different so maybe this is
something that you’ve experienced in the
workplace do you have any co-workers who
try to get away with doing minimal work
quite frustrating isn’t it so let’s talk
about how we can use this not just
siblings not just punishment but in a
little more advanced way we’ve got some
great sentences here Kahn says the
journalist tried to get away with a
criticism despite behaving badly
oh so maybe we could say he tried to get
away with not being criticized so maybe
a journalist said something completely
untrue in the media and the journalist
said something that is definitely not
true well if the journalist doesn’t
apologize or the journalist doesn’t say
oh actually I was wrong this is correct
instead they are trying to get away with
that false information so you could say
the journalist tried to get away with
not being criticized for his false news
oh he’s trying to get away from the
rules get away from some kind of
punishment maybe it’s not like your
parents punishment but some kind of
social punishment mom it says I have
co-workers who honestly don’t try to get
with get away with doing minimal work
okay so they’re hard workers
excellent Oh Raphael says my wife tries
to gate get away with avoiding English
lessons so let’s make sure that if we
use a verb after this we need to add ing
here get away with avoiding English
lessons maybe you want to learn English
with her you want to commit together and
she tries to get away with not doing
English lessons or like Shubham says
maybe they try to get away with murder
this is a typical expression when you’re
trying to show an exaggeration maybe in
your family your youngest sibling could
get away with anything you could say I
think that she could get away with
murder and no one would care so that’s
kind of we use that expression as a as
an exaggeration but it means a similar
thing Oh time Peck says American kids
get away with more than Thai kids this
is an interesting point maybe some
cultures treat kids differently so maybe
their way of punishing kids or raising
kids is different and that’s certainly
true in some countries it’s more strict
in some countries it’s more relaxed how
Betty says my supervisor always gets
away with taking less responsibility hmm
so we need to make sure that the action
is a negative thing my supervisor gets
away with doing less gets away with
having less responsibility and that’s
frustrating because you feel like you
can’t tell your supervisor to do more
you want them to just do more because
they’re the supervisor that’s a
difficult position to be in so I have a
final sentence that I want to share with
you about get away with this is another
a similar meaning but it’s a specific
situation I wonder what do you think
this sentence means I’m gonna write it
down here
how about usually this is used for women
maybe because women tend to care more
about clothes or fashion than men
typically so usually women use this more
than men but I want to see if you can
guess what this sentence means uh how
about she can get away with wearing um
pink dresses well to say this she can
get away with wearing pink dresses get
away with look in the situation I’m
pretty sure there’s not a real Fashion
Police
so when your friend wears a pink dress
there’s not a punishment they’re not
trying to avoid punishment what do you
think this means when we’re talking
about fashion because we often use this
to talk about clothing but it has a
specific idea hmm
Oh Adrianna has an idea maybe society
accepts more what she does
then what someone else does hmm well in
this situation it means that pink
dresses look good on her and usually
it’s a comparison with the person
talking she can get away with wearing
make sure we have our ing verb that’s
really important get away with wearing
pink dresses but I can’t if I wear a
pink dress I
think it looks terrible it’s not true I
don’t really have a pink dress but in
this situation you’re saying that she
can wear a pink dress it’s socially
acceptable there’s no social criticism
so we’re using a similar idea she’s
avoiding social criticism or she’s
avoiding some kind of negative feeling
she can get away with wearing pink
dresses but I can’t so maybe if you’re
at the store trying on clothes with your
friend and your friend tries on a yellow
sweater you might say oh I think you can
get away with wearing that sweater and
it means maybe the sweater is a little
strange but it looks good on you I think
you can wear it effectively I think you
can wear it and it’ll look nice you can
get away with wearing it so we often use
it in the specific context of clothing
of clothing so you guys have you guys
have written wonderful sentences about
get away with he can get away with
wearing red shoes yes this is a
compliment this is a compliment but it’s
also kind of a in an indirect negative
statement about yourself so if you say
oh you can get away with wearing red
shoes it means I can’t so it’s possible
that your friend might say oh yes you
can
no problem of course you can wear that
their reaction might be to reassure you
to make you feel better but they might
just say oh thank you
so you’re complimenting them but at the
same time you’re kind of saying
something negative about yourself they
can avoid social criticism because it
looks good but you can’t oh we’ve got
some wonderful thing
here to some great sentences that you
all have shared with me
thanks so much my brother can get away
with a costume that I don’t think I can
wear also maybe a suit my brother can
get away with wearing a suit but I feel
like a penguin yes yeah so I agree I
think this um this phrasal verb can be
complex there’s a general meaning to
avoid some kind of negative outcome
punishment social criticism more work
but in the end we can use this in a lot
of situations there’s a great sentence
here that someone wrote my government is
trying to get away with everything
mmm so maybe your government is secretly
trying to do things and they don’t want
some kind of some kind of punishment
maybe the public would go into the
streets and start yelling about it well
they want to get away with their actions
they don’t want any punishment they want
to do anything so we can use this in a
lot of situations to get away with
something he can my sister can get away
with wearing beanies okay so a little
hat my sister can get away with wearing
beanies but maybe I can’t so talking
about that comparison between you two
and of course with most phrasal verbs
there are multiple ways to use them but
today I want to present this main way to
use get away with to use get away with
or got away with because if we try to
learn 50 ways to use each phrasal verb
it’s going to be a lot and it’s going to
be difficult to remember exactly how to
use it so I hope that today you can use
it in this main way comfortably
confidently and if you have any
questions about it feel free to write
your question in the comment
below let’s try to use this sentence all
together to finish our lesson say it out
loud and use it with English how about
hmm how can we use this with English a
good sentence that we can say all
together how about let’s make it
negative I Oh
let’s let’s make this similar idea for
minimal work minimal work because you
want to work hard effectively and
efficiently but you want to work hard
and enjoy English so let’s make a
similar sentence for our final sentence
all together I don’t if you would like
to write this down feel free I don’t
want to get away with doing minimal work
in English I don’t want to get away with
doing minimal work in English I want to
use my time and take time if I only
study English for 5 minutes every day
it’s okay it’s better than nothing but
you’re trying to get away with doing
minimal work and it’s not going to be so
helpful so let’s say this sentence
together I don’t want to get away with
doing minimal work in English I want to
work hard when you really love something
you work hard and you don’t realize
you’re working because it’s fun so I
hope that during today’s lesson you
didn’t feel stressed or worried and you
didn’t feel like you’re doing hard work
you feel like you’re enjoying yourself
so let’s say the sentence altogether I
don’t want to get away with doing
minimal work in English it’s quite a
long sentence feel free to try to write
it out first that way you can read it
and then
we’ll say it quickly are you ready I
don’t want to get away with doing
minimal work in English I don’t want to
get away with doing minimal work in
English I want to work hard and
effectively and enjoy it I don’t want to
get away with doing minimal work in
English I hope that this is true for you
that you’re willing to take time and
enjoy it
maybe it doesn’t even feel like work and
that’s important to enjoy it so thank
you everyone for joining with me today
and not getting away with doing minimal
work but putting in effort and working
hard I appreciate it it’s gonna help you
to improve and it’s gonna help you to be
able to feel more comfortable using this
phrasal verb so if you would like to
continue to learn English with me I have
good news
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online and enjoy it don’t get away with
doing minimal work and if you would like
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at the end of our lesson so thank you
everyone for learning with me I hope
that you will not try to get away with
doing minimal work and that you’ll work
hard this week and enjoy it thanks so
much everyone have a beautiful day I’ll
see you again on Tuesday 9 a.m. est see
you later bye