chatter
part of speech
verb (chatter, chatters, chattered, chattering); noun (chatter — uncountable)
meaning for a pupil
1) To chatter is to talk quickly and a lot about small, unimportant things. tree →
2) When your teeth chatter, they knock together because you are very cold or scared. tree →
3) Birds and monkeys chatter when they make quick, repeated high sounds. tree →
4) Chatter is the sound of people or animals chattering. tree →
sense in the lessons
In school, «Stop chattering!» means stop talking in class. In science about the body, teeth chattering is shivering that helps warm you up. In stories, chatter fills busy places like the playground or a café; «idle chatter» means unimportant talk.
examples
- The girls chattered all the way home. tree →
- Stop chattering and listen, please. tree →
- My teeth were chattering in the freezing sea. tree →
- Monkeys chattered in the trees. tree →
- The classroom was full of happy chatter. tree →
- Magpies chatter loudly in the garden. tree →
- There was lots of chatter about the new teacher. tree →
- The nobleman was wet to the skin, and his teeth chattered. tree →
note
Regular verb: chattered. Uncountable noun: «a lot of chatter», not «chatters». Similar: babble, natter (UK), chat. «Chatterbox» is a friendly word for someone who talks a lot.
In the corpora
- Budgies are very chatty birds that chatter and whistle a lot, and some pet budgies have learnt to say hundreds of words.
- The Rat chatters away about the fire and the supper waiting at home and doesn't notice how quiet the Mole has gone.
- As the swallows chatter about the South, something new wakes up in the Rat: a longing to go too.
- Then they chatter of «violet seas, tawny sands, and lizard-haunted walls» (tawny = golden brown).
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «chatter» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.