contain
part of speech
verb (contain, contains, contained, containing)
meaning for a pupil
1) To contain means to have something inside. A box that contains toys has toys in it. tree →
2) To contain also means to be made of or to include: food that contains sugar. tree →
3) To contain something is to keep it under control, like containing a fire. tree →
sense in the lessons
maths: tells how many things are inside a box, bag or pack; often «each box contains 6», which is a rate; science: water contains oxygen and hydrogen; everyday life and safety: food labels say what a food contains (nuts, milk); a container holds things
examples
- Each box contains 12 crayons. tree →
- A bag contains 5 red and 3 blue marbles. tree →
- The jar contained 40 cookies. tree →
- How many pencils do 4 packs contain? tree →
- This cake contains nuts. tree →
- Fruit contains vitamins. tree →
- The firefighters contained the fire. tree →
- The book contains 20 stories. tree →
- Before her stood a glass bowl containing four gold-fish. tree →
note
«Each … contains n» is a rate: total = n × number of boxes, or boxes = total ÷ n. Trap: «contains 5 red and 3 blue» means the total is the sum, 8. Safety: read labels if you have an allergy.
In the corpora
- Coffee contains caffeine, which makes the brain feel more awake; people who drink it every morning feel slow and grumpy without it.
- Chocolate is poisonous to dogs, because it contains a chemical that dogs cannot break down well.
- Rhubarb stalks are safe to eat cooked, but rhubarb leaves are poisonous because they contain a lot of oxalic acid.
- Green potatoes and potato sprouts contain a mild poison, so they should not be eaten.
- Chocolate contains theobromine, which dogs break down very slowly, so it can make them very ill, dark chocolate most of all.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «contain» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.