Phrasal verb
chalk up
Definitions
01to achieve or record
phr.v. to achieve something good, like a victory or a high score, and add it to your total.
phr.v. to achieve or register a success, victory, or specific amount. Transitive and often used in competitive or financial contexts.
“The team managed to chalk up another win during their final game of the season.”
“By the end of the third quarter, the corporation had chalked up record profits, exceeding even the most optimistic analyst projections.”
Informal
Usage
Always takes a direct object, which is usually the achievement or amount being recorded.
02to attribute to a cause
phr.v. to say that something happened because of a particular reason, especially to learn from it.
phr.v. to attribute a particular event or outcome to a specific cause, often as a way of dismissing or explaining a failure.
“We can chalk the mistake up to experience and try again tomorrow.”
“The sudden drop in engagement was chalked up to a technical glitch in the algorithm rather than a lack of interest from the audience.”
Informal
Usage
Commonly used in the pattern 'chalk something up to something'.
Teaching tip
This sense is frequently used with 'experience' or 'bad luck' to suggest that a failure should be viewed as a lesson.
Teaching tip
explain the origin of writing scores on a chalkboard in a pub or shop to help students visualize 'recording' a number.
Etymology
Probably from the fact that many problems were figured out using chalk on a chalk board.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Phrasal verb
Particles
up
Separability
optional
Pattern
chalk + up + object