English Idioms

Kill Time

Meaning:

• Pass the time
• Use time until you ready for the next activity

Frequency of Use: High

1. I often kill time reading books on the bus until it arrives at school.
2. How do you kill time at home when there is nothing to do?
3. Our basketball tried to kill time near the end of the game so they could win.
4. My brother just killed time sitting in his bedroom instead of doing his homework.

1. If you take public transportation to work, how do you kill time until you arrive? If this doesn’t describe your situation, how do other people kill time in such cases?
2. If you had time to kill on a long plane flight, how would you do it?

You work for a restaurant as a cook, and you are working extremely hard to earn enough money to go to college. Unfortunately, you feel that you are doing most of the cleaning without any help from two other employees. Instead of helping you tidy up during slow times, they simply kill time playing on their phones. You asked the two workers to help you one time, but they got angry and told you to mind your own business. One of them even threatened you after work. You want to discuss this with the boss, but she and these two workers get along really well. What are you going to do?

Sometimes, learners know the meaning of an idiom, but they don’t know how to use it correctly in conversation or writing. Thus, this activity checks your grammatical accuracy with the idiom so you become more confident in using it.