Phrasal Verb Fun

get ahead
In any race, the person, horse or car in front of the others, the one who is
winning, is
ahead
.
Many of us think that life is a race. At the beginning, all the runners are
together, but, sooner or later, some of them start getting ahead. They are
winning, and the cameras are on them.
(The others that we don't notice start to
get behind
. or
fall behind
)
All ambitious people - and usually their parents as well - want to get
ahead.
Fixed expression.
get along
Jimmie has a problem at work. He doesn't get along with his colleagues
at all. Whatever they do, they just don't get along. They can't work
together.
When two people get along (we often say
get on
), it means that they are
comfortable together. For example, they can work together in the same
office without trouble.
By extension, one of the two gets along with the other.
GET ALONG is more American than British English. The equivalent is
get on
.
GET ALONG is a
two-word verb without an object
No problem.
GET ALONG WITH is a
three-word verb
. No problem either.
get at
Why do they have bars in the lions' cages in the zoo? Is it so that the lions
can't get at the little boys, or so that the little boys can't get at the lions?
At
is frequently more confrontational and aggressive than
to
. (Think of
come at
, compared with come to me, which is welcoming.)

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To get at something means to reach it, to be able to touch it.
Inseparable two-word verb
No problem.

get away with
Away
means you never see it again
When you rob a bank (Remember, you steal the money but you rob the
owner), you have to get away fast. In fact, there is often a get-away car
waiting for you. However, getting away is not much use if you are not
carrying large sacks of money. You have to get away with the money.
By extension, we talk of somebody getting away with a crime, when we
mean he commits a crime and escapes punishment.
In Victorian London, there was a famous serial killer called Jack the
Ripper. He was never caught. He got away with it. He got away with
murder.
Three-word verb
. No problem.
get back at
Get at
means something aggressive, as
at
can do, and
back
nearly
always has the sense of 'return', so to get back at someone means
revenge. You get back at the (insulting word) because he first got at you.
There was a case in England some years ago about a spy working for
one of the government listening posts. He betrayed his wife and his
country in some way. She 'forgave' him and he confessed to her, but she
got back at him by
giving him up
. She got a divorce and he got fourteen
years.
Three-word verb
No problem.
get back into
Apart from the literal meaning, It was dawn so Dracula got back into his
coffin, this follows from
be into
.
Doris really likes Spanish Muslim architecture. She was really into it, but
she had too many things to do. Years later, when her children could live
by themselves, she got back into it.
Three-word verb
No problem.
get behind

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Samantha's parents are very worried. When they read her reports from
school, they fear that she is getting behind, so they are hiring a special
teacher.
Life is often a race, we think. At the beginning, all the runners are
together, but, sooner or later, some of them start to
get ahead
. They are
winning, and they win the prizes, but the others that we don't notice are
getting behind.
Falling behind
means exactly the same.
Fixed expression.
get by
In space,
by
has the general idea of 'next to' or 'close to'. When you are
in the cinema happily waiting for the film to start, there is always someone
late who has to push past your knees. To get by an obstacle means to get
past the obstacle with a little difficulty.
By extension, poor people find that getting by the obstacles of life more
difficult. So that getting by is now the idea of 'surviving a hard life'.
You may well have seen simple English teaching books with titles like 'Get
By in English'. The idea is to survive in English.
Two-word verb without an object
No problem.
get down to
Mrs Higgins. I'm sorry to tell you, but when we get down to it, your son is
a lazy pudding.
Work is normally a serious down-to-earth activity. It is practical, so when
we get
down
to it, usually it means we get down to something serious.
Sometimes, by extension, it means to get to the heart of the matter.
We could also say
When we
come down to
it, your son doesn’t like working.
The meaning is the same.
Three-word verb
. No problem.
get into
Quite recent, I think. To get into something is to be absorbed by it, to be
fascinated by it.
Julian hated the idea of studying the history of statistical methods, but he
gradually got into it, and now he
is into
it and has become an expert.

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Inseparable two-word verb
No problem.