flock
part of speech
noun (flock, flocks); verb (flock, flocks, flocked, flocking)
meaning for a pupil
1) A flock is a group of birds or sheep together. tree →
2) A flock is a big crowd of people. tree →
3) To flock is to come together or go somewhere in large numbers: «people flocked to the beach». tree →
sense in the lessons
a group of animals counted as one; animals per flock is a rate; animals join or leave the flock; in science: birds fly in flocks to stay safe and find food, some flocks migrate together; in stories: a shepherd looks after his flock; phrases: «a flock of sheep», «flock to», «birds of a feather flock together» (similar people stay together)
examples
- A flock of 30 sheep grazed on the hill. tree →
- 8 birds flew away from the flock. tree →
- There are 4 flocks with 12 geese each. tree →
- How many birds are in the flock now? tree →
- A flock of geese flew south for the winter. tree →
- The shepherd counted his flock every evening. tree →
- Crowds flocked to the beach on the hot day. tree →
- Birds of a feather flock together. tree →
note
A group word: birds joining add, birds flying away take away; flocks × birds per flock = all birds. Trap: count birds, not flocks, unless asked. Other group words: a herd of cows, a school of fish, a pack of wolves.
In the corpora
- Picture a hillside: a shepherd whistles, the dog swings left round the flock, and three hundred sheep move as one.
- A pet budgie is a flock bird living in a house.
- Donkeys, llamas and sheepdogs are used to guard flocks, and a guard donkey will chase away foxes and stray dogs.
- Budgies are flock birds that need a friend, a big cage and time to fly in a safe room.
- A collective noun names a group, like a team, a class, a herd or a flock of sheep.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «flock» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.