cotton on

verb

1. to perceive the meaning (of)

2. to make use (of)

Example Sentences

The precocious girls soon cotton on to the headmistress’s ruse and parry her appeals to dish on Miss Brodie.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

Some of Trump’s targets have cottoned on to his practice of letting bluster do the hard work of policymaking, rather than painstakingly drafting his policies so they’re legally and constitutionally bulletproof.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Racist text messages are targeting Black Americans across the country, telling them they've been selected to be enslaved and forced to pick cotton on a plantation.

Read more on Salon

Did they cotton on to the fact that Trump was advocating depriving all Virginia public and private K-12 schools, nursery schools, child care centers and home schools of federal funding?

Read more on Los Angeles Times

Men ferry bales of cotton on forklifts, and automated equipment cleans the cotton and transforms it into spun yarns that can be made into fabric.

Read more on New York Times