idea
part of speech
noun (an idea, ideas)
meaning for a pupil
1) A thought or plan that comes into your mind, especially a new one: a good idea. tree →
2) What you know or think about something: «I have no idea». tree →
3) The main point or purpose: «The idea of the game is to …». tree →
4) An opinion or belief: «She has her own ideas about it». tree →
sense in the lessons
In school: brainstorm ideas, the main idea of a paragraph, a writing idea; in science an idea you test is a hypothesis. In everyday life: «good idea», «bad idea» — judging if a plan is safe or sensible. Phrases: good idea, no idea, get the idea, have an idea, main idea, the idea of, bright idea.
examples
- I have an idea: let's build a fort! tree →
- That's a good idea. tree →
- I have no idea where my shoes are. tree →
- What is the main idea of this paragraph? tree →
- The idea of the game is to reach the end first. tree →
- Climbing on the roof is a bad idea. tree →
- We shared our ideas in a group. tree →
- Do you get the idea? tree →
- Then an idea came to him. tree →
note
Countable: an idea (with «an» because it starts with a vowel sound), ideas. Say «eye-DEE-uh». «No idea» = I don't know. «Idea» is not the same as «ideal» (perfect).
In the corpora
- Arguments on TV get people watching, so some are allowed or even planned; that does not make shouting a good idea.
- Bots are good at giving long lists of ideas quickly, such as names for a kitten.
- Using AI to understand an idea, then doing the work yourself, is like having a patient tutor.
- The "10,000 hours" idea was made famous by the writer Malcolm Gladwell, based on research by the psychologist Anders Ericsson.
- A demo is a rough first recording made to show the idea of a song; it does not need to sound perfect.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «idea» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.