painful

«painful» in Mova's school dictionary: causing pain or hurting — 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

adjective (painful, more painful, most painful)

meaning for a pupil

1) Painful means causing pain or hurting. tree →

2) Painful means making you feel sad, upset or embarrassed. tree →

3) Painful can mean very hard or slow to watch or do. tree →

sense in the lessons

In health and first-aid lessons pupils describe painful injuries (a painful knee, a painful bee sting) and tell an adult when something is painful. In feelings lessons a painful memory or a painful goodbye. Phrases: a painful injury, painful to watch, painfully slow, painful memory.

examples

• My sprained ankle was very painful. tree →
• A bee sting can be painful. tree →
• Tell the nurse where it is painful. tree →
• Saying goodbye to our dog was painful. tree →
• It was painful to watch our team lose. tree →
• The splinter was small but painful. tree →
• The scene of past sufferings revives painful memories. tree →

note

Adjective from «pain» + «-ful» (one l). Adverb: painfully. Opposite: painless. Do not confuse «painful» (it hurts you) with «in pain» (you are hurting): «My knee is painful» / «I am in pain».

In the corpora

• The bullet ant has one of the most painful insect stings known, and the pain can last for many hours.
• The bullet ant of South America has one of the most painful stings of any insect.
• Losing a job is painful and frightening, so bosses, newspapers and governments reach for soft words when they talk about it.
• Biting nails and picking the skin around them can let germs in and cause painful infections.
• Rubbing an eye with dirty hands can scratch it or carry germs into it, causing a painful infection.

Trees and pragmatics

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