hour
part of speech
noun (hour, hours; casual: hrs, hr)
meaning for a pupil
1) An hour is a length of time; it has sixty minutes. tree →
2) An hour can mean a time of day: «at this hour». tree →
3) Hours can mean the time when something is open or when someone works: «school hours». tree →
4) (casual) «Hours» can mean a long time, not counted: «I waited for hours!»; «hrs» and «hr» are short forms in texts and timetables. tree →
5) (casual) «The small hours» are the hours after midnight; «on the hour» means at 1:00, 2:00 and so on. tree →
6) (formal) Exams and notices say «per hour», «hourly», «a duration of», «hours of operation» and «elapsed time». tree →
sense in the lessons
sixty minutes; a unit of time: N hours = N × 60 minutes; a day has 24 hours; speed is often given per hour; phrases: «an hour», «half an hour», «hours and hours», «rush hour», «opening hours», «per hour», «on the hour», «after hours»; in casual talk «took hours», «back in an hr», «like an hour ago»; in rough talk «I've been waiting a bloody hour»; in the exam voice «the elapsed duration in hours», «at a uniform rate of 60 kilometres per hour», «hours of operation»
examples
- How many minutes are in 3 hours? tree →
- Max sleeps 9 hours each night. tree →
- An hour has 60 minutes. tree →
- A day has 24 hours. tree →
- The car drove at 60 kilometres per hour. tree →
- The roads are busy at rush hour. tree →
- We waited for half an hour. tree →
- The bus comes every hour, on the hour. tree →
- back in an hr, chicken's in the oven tree →
- I've been waiting a bloody hour for this bus! tree →
- A vehicle proceeds at a uniform rate of 60 kilometres per hour for a duration of 3 hours. Compute the distance travelled. tree →
- The library's hours are 9 to 5. tree →
- He waited one hour, two hours. tree →
note
An hour is 60 minutes. A day is 24 hours. N hours = N × 60 minutes. Hours are added and subtracted like counts. «for hours» in talk means a long time, not a number. «hourly» means once every hour. Grammar: «an hour» (the h is silent). Trap: «hour» and «our» sound the same.
In the corpora
- Shops, hospitals, buses and factories need people at all hours, so their workers follow a rota that can change every week.
- Overtime is working extra hours beyond the normal ones; sometimes it is paid at a higher rate, sometimes not paid at all.
- Labour can take many hours, so a grandparent or friend often comes to look after the older children.
- A newborn baby needs feeding every two or three hours, day and night, because its stomach is tiny.
- Waiting is a big part of hospitals: waiting to be seen, waiting for results, waiting for visiting hours.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «hour» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.