little
part of speech
adjective (little, littler, littlest — usually smaller, smallest); determiner, pronoun (little, less, least; a little); adverb
meaning for a pupil
1) Little means small in size: a little house. tree →
2) Little means young: my little brother. tree →
3) «A little» means a small amount, some: a little milk. tree →
4) «Little» without «a» means not much, almost none: little time. tree →
5) As an adverb, a little means slightly: a little tired. tree →
sense in the lessons
«a little revision» = a short review; «a little box» = a small one; in everyday life «little by little» (slowly), «a little bit», «little finger»; in stories Little Red Riding Hood, the little pig
examples
- First, a little revision of what we learned before … tree →
- A little box holds 4 crayons. tree →
- My little sister is three. tree →
- Can I have a little more juice? tree →
- There is little water left in the bottle. tree →
- I am a little tired after the race. tree →
- Little by little the snowman melted. tree →
- The three little pigs built three houses. tree →
- "I can!" said the little Rabbit. tree →
note
No operation clue. «a little» goes with things you cannot count (a little sugar); «a few» with things you can (a few sweets). Trap: «a little» is an amount you cannot count exactly, not a number.
In the corpora
- One worker alone has little power, but many together are much harder to ignore.
- It does not mean the family is in danger; it means there is little left after the bills.
- "Money's tight" means little is left after the bills for extras; it does not mean the family is in danger.
- Families visit graves, send cards, mark the anniversary, hold memorial services and even put up benches with little plaques.
- A keepsake can be very precious even when it is worth little money, so you should ask before touching it.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «little» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.