Analyzing the phrasal verb 'to tell someone off'

Transcript:

Even though he was a hero Tom's primary concern after the accident was his mum finding out that he had driven the tracktor. He says, please don't tell my mom she'll tell me off the driving, the tractor, his mom's response he's might as well hit. Right? I can't tell you. How proud I am of him.

0:14

She'll tell me off the driving the tracktor.

0:24 Introduction

Hello guys. Today here on the vocab, man, we tackle a phrasal verb "to tell someone off". So basically if you tell someone off you speak to them, angrily or seriously because they have done something wrong. For example, "my parents told me off for not doing the homework" or "they told me all for watching the Netflix series called Fargo".

0:54

So now let's have a closer look at a very short audio clip. In which you are going to be able to find the phrasal verb. So be prepared. Um, the most endearing thing of Paolo was his love of field hockey. Um, and he would have talked about as a child in Punjab, his mum having to ground him or tell him off because she found him practicing his field hockey strokes late at night in his bedroom.

1:21

I will play it a second time. And this time I'm going to stop after a few seconds. And give you more information.
Um, the most endearing thing of Paolo was his love of feeld hokey. The most embarrassing thing means something like the thing that you love the most or that you fancy the most Paolo is the name of the guy the speaker is referring to, loves the most hockeyand it's not ice hockey, but it's field hockey. Um, and he would have talked about as a child in Punjab, his mum having to ground him or tell him is a state of India located in the Northwestern part of the sub continent. And there was another expression here to ground him

2:09 Informal use

So this is a difficult one. I guess it's very informal. It's very informal. And it is used. For example, when your parents prohibit you from taking part in some usual activities. So maybe you didn't do your homework and then you could be grounded for a week. For example, his mum having to ground him or tell him off because she found him practicing his field hockey strokes late at night in his bedroom.

2:45

And I have to admit that it is not that easy to follow and to catch the meaning. So don't give up, go back and relisten to it, or have a look at the transcript, which will help you to support you in the process of learning to understand more, to understand the speaking words of a native speaker,

3:13 Some synonyms

To reprimand or to scold. So that's almost it for today, guys, to be honest, I got the idea covering this specific phrasal verb from the book called practical everyday English. And you might already know that teacher Zdenek recommended it on episode 47 here on the Vocab Man.

3:45

I have to say it really, it really helped me personally as well, because I've learned a lot of expressions from that series of books.

And I can only recommend it.

3:55

I will say that I am very happy about my purchase so far. I could learn a lot of things.

4:05

Kind of all over the place. So it's a bit of phrasal verb, some idiot, just a bit of slang as well. So it's, it seems like the author of the book tried to go for expressions that are used a lot, you know, that's why it's called practical everyday English.
So these are expressions that perhaps you wouldn't find, sometimes you wouldn't find them necessarily in a classic cause book. Yeah. Like some of those slang expressions, perhaps some of the idioms,

3:45

This book focuses on practical expressions, which we use in our daily life. That's also what we are trying to do here on this podcast.
The Vocab Man is meant to help you learn relevant expressions, idioms, phrasal, alerts, and stuff. So I hope you like it. I am Daniel. Thanks for listening. And I hope that you will tune in for the next episode, which is coming soon.

Have a good one.