🇬🇧👶 OUT YOU GO! DOWN YOU GET! 👶🇬🇧
Hello hello my dear friends! I hope you're all fine and dandy. I wanted to put together this simple but effective post on a type of Fronting that you all know but is ridiculously common in spoken English especially with kids aka your students and your own. 😎
👨🏫 GET DOWN vs DOWN YOU GET
The imperative is a command and is tough; you mean business. When I came to Russia and heard students ask, "Give me a pen!" I was shocked... and scared 😁 "Down you get!" is a much softer command and can be said neutrally or with affection. You would mainly use this with kids. With adults then it would be playful to some degree.
✅ CONTEXT
Imagine I sternly used the imperative: Get up! Maybe a child is in danger, or being naughty and I've had enough. Now imagine I say: Up you get! Maybe the child fell over and needs a sympathetic parent, or is being a tiny bit stubborn in a playful way.
❗ Your stress and intonation can soften an imperative and harden Fronting. Remember that!
✅ EXAMPLES + MEANINGS
UP YOU GET
👉 Maybe the child has fallen over, playing on the floor, you want the child to climb onto something
UP YOU COME
👉 You want the child to come and sit on your lap, or to climb onto your bed, or you say this as you lift the child up into your arms for a hug
UP YOU GO
👉 When you push the child up somewhere or place them on something
DOWN YOU GET
👉 In any situation when you want a child to climb down from anywhere like a table, sofa, a tree,
DOWN YOU COME
👉 Same as above but towards you or into your arms
DOWN YOU GO
👉 when you finished hugging and put your child down, or said when you push your child down a slide
IN YOU GET
👉 Into a car, into bed, when going home through the front door, into a Wendy house
IN YOU COME
👉 Same as above but towards you
IN YOU GO
👉 Same as the first one but this involves you helping by pushing or holding the child's hand
OUT YOU GET
👉 Used when telling a kid to get out of the car, the house (with you), from their high chair, from their cot, from a box, Wendy house etc
OUT YOU COME
👉 Same as above but towards you
OUT YOU GO
👉 Same as the first one but away from you
OFF YOU GET
👉 When you want the kid to get down from your lap, or when they're sitting or standing on something
OFF YOU COME
👉 (not very common) same as above but towards you
OFF YOU GO
👉 Leave somewhere to go and do something like to play with toys
⚽ You can also use IT when referring to objects:
DOWN IT GOES
👉 Like pushing a ball down a slide or when a child swallows food
UP IT GOES
👉 When you and your child watches something raise like a boot door, or some ride, or some device that moves upwards
