Difficulty: Easy
Correct Answer: Work harmoniously
Explanation:
Introduction / Context:
This question tests your understanding of the idiom pull together, which is often used in workplaces, teams, and communities. The phrase describes how people behave when they cooperate effectively. Choosing the correct explanation requires you to focus on joint effort and harmony rather than individual success or general happiness.
Given Data / Assumptions:
Concept / Approach:
To pull together means to cooperate and work in a coordinated, harmonious way toward a shared goal or to deal with a difficult situation. The word pull suggests effort, while together suggests unity. Among the options, work harmoniously exactly captures this idea of coordinated effort. Becoming friends, being successful, or living happily may sometimes result from pulling together, but they are not the direct meaning of the idiom.
Step-by-Step Solution:
Step 1: Recall example sentences such as If we all pull together, we can finish this project on time.Step 2: Identify the key idea: different people cooperating in a united way.Step 3: Compare this with work harmoniously, which means to work in peace and coordination without conflict.Step 4: Evaluate become friends, which focuses on forming relationships, not on cooperative work.Step 5: Evaluate be successful and live happily; both describe outcomes, not the process of joint effort. Therefore, work harmoniously is the best explanation of pull together in this context.
Verification / Alternative check:
Imagine a company manager saying We must all pull together if the business is to survive. They are asking employees to cooperate and work in unity, not simply to become friends or focus on their own success. Similarly, in a family facing a crisis, someone might say This is the time to pull together as a family. Again, the emphasis is on coordinated effort and mutual support in action. These examples confirm that work harmoniously matches the idiom meaning.
Why Other Options Are Wrong:
Become friends describes the start of a relationship but does not necessarily involve working together on a shared task. Be successful can apply to individual achievement without any cooperation. Live happily is a very broad phrase that covers general well being, not specific teamwork. None of these options highlights the crucial aspect of coordinated group effort that is central to pull together.
Common Pitfalls:
Students may mistakenly choose be successful because teams that pull together often succeed. However, the question asks for the meaning of the idiom itself, not for a possible result. Separating cause from consequence is important in idiom questions. Focusing on the action described by the words pull and together leads you directly to the idea of joint, harmonious work.
Final Answer:
The idiom Pull together means to work harmoniously with others toward a common goal, so option B is correct.
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