keen

«keen» in Mova's school dictionary: very eager or interested: «She is keen on football.» — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 2 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

adjective (keen, keener, keenest)

meaning for a pupil

1) Keen means very eager or interested: «She is keen on football.» tree →

2) Keen means sharp or strong: «keen eyesight», «a keen wind». tree →

3) (UK/Australia informal) Keen to do something means wanting to do it: «Are you keen?» = do you want to come? tree →

sense in the lessons

In everyday UK, Irish, Australian and NZ speech «keen» means interested or willing. In science, animals with keen senses (eagles' eyes) are described this way. Phrases: «keen on», «keen to», «a keen eye», «not keen».

examples

• He's keen on dinosaurs. tree →
• Are you keen to come to the park? tree →
• Eagles have keen eyesight. tree →
• A keen wind blew across the beach. tree →
• I'm not keen on spinach. tree →
• She is a keen reader — two books a week! tree →
• His keen eyes scanned the wide plain. tree →

note

«Keen on» + noun or -ing; «keen to» + verb. Not keen = doesn't like much (polite). Old sense «sharp» as in a keen blade.

In the corpora

• Being too keen to agree and praise is called being "sycophantic".
• Letting little ones win sometimes keeps them keen; older children usually want real wins, and can ask to play properly.

Trees and pragmatics

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