paw

«paw» in Mova's school dictionary: the foot of an animal like a cat, dog, bear or rabbit… — 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

noun (a paw, paws); verb (paw, paws, pawed, pawing)

meaning for a pupil

1) A paw is the foot of an animal like a cat, dog, bear or rabbit, usually with claws and soft pads. tree →

2) To paw something means to touch or scratch it with a paw, like a dog pawing at the door. tree →

3) To paw at something can mean a person touches it roughly or too much; «paws» is also a jokey word for hands. tree →

4) Paw can also mean the hoof of a horse, which a horse scrapes at the ground with, often when it is impatient. tree →

sense in the lessons

In science, paws help animals walk, run, dig, climb and hold food; pads cushion steps and claws grip. In everyday life with pets: a dog pawing at the door wants to go out; check a pet's paws for thorns, hot pavements or ice. In stories animals «raise a paw». Phrases: «paw prints», «a paw at the door», «get your paws off».

examples

• The cat licked its paw. tree →
• The dog pawed at the door to go out. tree →
• We saw bear paw prints in the snow. tree →
• My puppy gave me his paw. tree →
• Hot pavements in summer can burn a dog's paws. tree →
• The kitten batted the ball with its paw. tree →
• Get your paws off my cake! tree →
• The lion rested its head on its huge paws. tree →
• Outside stood his faithful charger, pawing the ground. tree →

note

Countable: «a paw, paws». Homophones: «pour», «pore» and «poor» sound the same as «paw» for many speakers in the UK, Australia and New Zealand; in the US they usually sound different. Horses and cows have hooves, not paws; birds have feet or claws.

In the corpora

• The soles of a polar bear's paws have fur and small bumps that grip the ice and keep the feet warm.
• A raccoon dipping food in water is feeling it, not washing it; water makes its paws even more sensitive.
• Most cats have 18 toes, five on each front paw and four on each back paw, and cats walk on their toes.
• Your dog is fast asleep on the rug, but its paws are paddling, its lips twitch and it gives tiny muffled woofs.
• Drifting along, the Mole trails a paw in the water and dreams.

Trees and pragmatics

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