“Hi Jane, are we still on for the movies tonight?” “Sure pick me up at 7 and maybe on the way back we can drop in on Sally and the gang for a drink.”
From standard conversations like this one to more professional conversations native English speakers will constantly be using phrasal verbs to express ideas. The strange thing is that non native English speakers even those with a high level often don’t know these phrasal verbs. Consequently, a non native speaker can quickly feel hesitant and confused even in a simple conversation – what a shame.
It’s true there are a lot of phrasal verbs and often the same phrasal verb can be used to communicate different things but it’s a real weakness in the schooling systems that are not giving enough importance to phrasal verbs. It’s also true that often there is a standard verb that can express the same information as the phrasal verb but often there’s not. Trying to replace pick you up with a regular verb can quickly sound strange…maybe – I’ll collect you at 7, might work but it’s certainly not the usual expression.
So what’s the solution? First, start being more sensitive to the use of phrasal verbs, which are not just used in spoken language, but are also used a lot in written language, often to say something in a shorter more stylistic way e.g. the recent budget deficit blow outs in the UK have lead to a run on the pound.
The second way is simply to learn them. Directional phrasal verbs like get down or go away are straight forward and logical. Ones like – Do you get it? or Are you catching on? both which mean do you understand might need to be learnt by heart. The way you learn them is the same way you should learn any new vocabulary in the context of a sentence and / or a situation. The best site I’ve found for learning phrasal verbs is the English Pages’ website at the following link: http://www.englishpage.com/prepositions/prepositions.html
Lots of luck
David