10 English Idioms with "fall": Practice Linking and Dark L

It’s October and fall is officially here. This is my favorite time of year- I love the colors, the smells, the crispness in the air and all things pumpkin! 🍁🍂🎃☕️🥰

So in honor of this fabulous season, this lesson focuses on 10 common idioms and phrasal verbs with the word “fall.” 

And bonus, since this word ends with the dark L sound it also gives us a great opportunity to practice how to articulate this tricky sound as well as how to link it to other sounds.

Awesome, right?

So let’s dive in!

Additional lessons you may find helpful:

How to Pronounce the Dark L

The Light L: L vs R

Practice phrases and sentences used in this lesson:

Fall through (felllthrough): something fails to happen

We were supposed to meet up for dinner, but our plans fell through.

The contract on the house fell through.

Fall off (falll-loff): the amount or number of something becomes less

Business tends to fall off during the summer months.

Our sales really fell off last month.

Fall apart (falll-lapart): to become very emotional where you can’t think or act in the usual way

When her dad died, she completely fell apart.

Fall apart can also mean to fail or stop working:

This entire plan fell apart.

Fall into place (falll-linto place): to fit together, become organized or make sense

Once I knew the truth, things began to fall into place.

After 6 months in the new house, things are finally beginning to fall into place.

Fall into someone’s lap (falll-linto): to be received unexpectedly or without effort.

This new position just fell into my lap.

He doesn’t even try. Everything just falls into his lap!

Fall into the wrong hands (falll-linto): For something to be acquired by someone who’s not supposed to have it and may use it for nefarious (evil) purposes

Please keep this information to yourself. I don’t want it to fall into the wrong hands.

We don’t want this weapon to fall into the wrong hands.

Take the fall: to take the blame for something someone else did

This is your fault and I won’t take the fall.

He did it, but she took the fall.

Fall for (fall fer)

Fall for someone: to start to love or become infatuated with someone

He fell for her in 5 minutes.

She always falls for the wrong guy.

Fall for something (fall fer): to be deceived by something, especially a lie

I told them there weren’t any cookies left and they fell for it.

I can’t believe he fell for that.

Fall short (falllshort): something doesn’t reach the desired amount, standard or expectations

The final product fell short of my expectations.

We fell short of our goal by a thousand dollars.

Fall off the radar (falll-loff): to be ignored or forgotten in favor of something more important or more significant

I’ve been so busy getting the house ready to sell everything else fell off my radar.

They had a hit single in the 90s then completely fell off the radar.