flow

«flow» in Mova's school dictionary: Of a liquid, gas or electricity: to move along smoothly… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 5 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

verb (flow, flows, flowed, flowing); noun (flow — uncountable; a flow)

meaning for a pupil

1) Of a liquid, gas or electricity: to move along smoothly and steadily in one direction. tree →

2) Of people, traffic or ideas: to move or come continuously: «The traffic flowed smoothly». tree →

3) Of hair or clothes: to hang down loosely. tree →

4) A noun: a steady movement of something: the flow of a river, a flow of air. tree →

5) Of speech or writing: to sound smooth and natural. tree →

sense in the lessons

In science: liquids flow, solids don't (they keep their shape); water flows downhill because of gravity; rivers flow to the sea; electricity flows round a complete circuit; blood flows through veins and arteries; lava flows from volcanoes; flow charts in maths and computing. In safety: fast-flowing rivers are dangerous — never swim in them. Phrases: flow into, flow out, flow downhill, go with the flow, flow chart, blood flow, lava flow, ebb and flow.

examples

• Rivers flow into the sea. tree →
• Water flows downhill. tree →
• Liquids can flow, but solids keep their shape. tree →
• Electricity flows through the wires when the circuit is complete. tree →
• Don't swim in fast-flowing water. tree →
• Blood flows around your body. tree →
• Her long hair flowed down her back. tree →
• Make a flow chart to show the steps. tree →
• In and out of it flowed water like attar. tree →

note

Regular verb: flowed. Don't confuse «flowed» (from flow) with «flown» (from fly) or «floor». «Go with the flow» = relax and accept what happens.

In the corpora

• Shark skin is covered in tiny tooth-like scales called dermal denticles that help water flow smoothly, and some swimsuits copy them.
• The Amazon carries about a fifth of all the river water that flows into the world's seas.
• An anaconda kills by squeezing until the prey's blood stops flowing, not by crushing bones.
• An amoeba moves by flowing its inside forward into a bulge called a false foot, and it swallows food by flowing around it.
• Ducks' feet stay just above freezing on ice because warm blood flowing in heats the cold blood coming back.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «flow» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.