grab

«grab» in Mova's school dictionary: to take hold of something quickly and roughly — 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 (grab, grabs, grabbed, grabbing); noun (a grab)

meaning for a pupil

1) To grab is to take hold of something quickly and roughly. tree →

2) To grab can mean to get something quickly: «grab a snack», «grab a seat». tree →

3) To grab someone's attention is to make them notice. tree →

4) «Up for grabs» means free for anyone to take. tree →

sense in the lessons

an action of taking: grabbing some items from a bag or bowl, which takes them away from there or adds them to a person; in manners: do not grab, ask nicely and take turns; in safety: grab the rail if you slip; in stories: a hand grabbed him in the dark; phrases: «grab hold of», «grab a bite», «up for grabs»

examples

• Tom grabbed 5 sweets from the bowl. tree →
• She grabs 3 apples each time. tree →
• After he grabbed 4 cookies, 9 were left. tree →
• Each child grabs 2 balloons. tree →
• Don't grab, ask nicely and wait your turn. tree →
• He grabbed the rail when the bus stopped. tree →
• Let's grab a sandwich before the film. tree →
• The bright poster grabbed my attention. tree →
• The last seat is up for grabs. tree →
• She leaped upon the boards and made a grab at him and fell back. tree →

note

An action like «take»: what is grabbed leaves the place and joins the person. Trap: decide whose amount is asked; the bowl loses but the child gains (grabbed 4, 9 left → 13 at first). Past: grabbed (double b).

In the corpora

• Families make phone rules so meals are for talking, and adults find them hard to keep because phones are built to grab attention.
• A great grey owl can plunge through deep snow to grab a vole it has only heard.
• They have no venom; they hunt by grabbing prey and wrapping it in their coils, which is why they are called constrictors.
• Snakes bite people mostly when they are trodden on, grabbed or cornered.
• A ladybird's red and black are a warning: it tastes bitter and oozes yellow liquid from its knees when grabbed.

Trees and pragmatics

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