phrasal verbs vs. two-word verbs

[lolwhites]

On my Diploma course I was told that if the particle has an adverbial meaning it's separable, but if it's prepositional, you can't separate the two. So you can say the cat ran up the tree but not the cat ran the tree up (prepositional meaning). You can say I ran up a huge phone bill but can you say I ran a huge phone bill up (adverbial)? I ran the cat over is fine, except for the cat, but not I ran the bridge over. No wonder students get confused.

[Lorikeet]

On my Diploma course I was told that if the particle has an adverbial meaning it's separable, but if it's prepositional, you can't separate the two. So you can say the cat ran up the tree but not the cat ran the tree up (prepositional meaning). You can say I ran up a huge phone bill but can you say I ran a huge phone bill up (adverbial)? I ran the cat over is fine, except for the cat, but not I ran the bridge over. No wonder students get confused.

How can you tell if the particle has an adverbial or prepositional meaning? Of course, I ran over the bridge is easy to see. What about "I got over my cold." (Not "I got my cold over.") This is an adverbial meaning? and "I marked up the bill." and "I marked the bill up." is a prepositional meaning? Sorry I don't get it yet, but I have been known to be a little slow with grammatical tags

[sita]

Hi!

At uni we were taught multi word verbs

Siân

[Neville & Nash]

In the classroom, what term do you use to refer to verbs like "put on," "look up," "give in," "turn off," etc.?

Verb + preposition and phrasal verbs are two different concepts.
Verb + preposition. The preposition should amost always be the same and above all the preposition will not change the meaning.
Ex. Look up! means to look toward the sky or ceilling.

The meaning of the phrasal verb will depend on the preposition you use and will change the meaning and may have several meanings depending on context.
Ex. Look up can mean consult a reference in the dictionary, to look for someone in the yello pages,. EX look me up when you arrive in New York. or Did you look up the word in the dictionary.

I hope this helps you in differentiating both