English Phrasal Verbs - Laugh AT or Laugh WITH

Hi, Teacher Fred here. Welcome to my classroom!

I have a deck of cards and each card has a different phrasal verb or idiom.

So, what I'm going to do now is shuffle- this is called shuffling the cards. Shuffle the cards and mix them up. I'm going to shuffle the cards; here we are: this is the Las Vegas of English class.

I'm going to shuffle the cards and then I'll cut them. (Cut them means go like this.) And then we'll see which one is on the bottom.

What does it say? To laugh at someone or laugh with someone.

Laughing, you know, means ha ha ha. Laugh: ha ha ha.

But there's a difference in meaning if you say laugh at someone or laugh with someone.

If somebody is laughing at you, it's not very nice. Because they are saying, "You are stupid. Ha ha ha- you're stupid. You did something stupid." It's not good, you know? So if somebody laughs at me, I don't really like it. Because they think I'm stupid.

Laugh with someone, though, that's fun. That means you're just laughing together. You see something funny together, and you're laughing. You're enjoying it together. You're laughing with someone.

Laughing at someone: "You're crazy! Ha ha ha! Look what you did! It's funny and you're stupid!"

Laugh with someone: laughing together. We see something funny, so we're laughing together.

Laugh at someone or laugh with someone: they have a difference in meaning. One is good, polite; one is not so good, not polite.

You don't like it if somebody laughs at you but you do like it if you laugh with someone.

Okay- do you see? Do you have any questions?

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