potato
part of speech
noun (potato, potatoes)
meaning for a pupil
1) A potato is a vegetable that grows under the ground; we eat it cooked. tree →
2) A couch potato is a person who sits watching TV a lot. tree →
sense in the lessons
In maths: a thing counted, weighed or bought; potatoes in bags (kg or pounds); rows of potatoes planted. In science: a potato is a tuber, a swollen underground stem that stores food; potatoes can grow new plants from their «eyes». In everyday life: chips, fries, mashed potatoes, crisps. In history: the potato famine in Ireland.
examples
- She peeled 8 potatoes. tree →
- A bag holds 5 kg of potatoes. tree →
- Each potato weighs 200 grams. tree →
- He planted 3 rows of potatoes. tree →
- We had baked potatoes for dinner. tree →
- Potatoes grow under the ground. tree →
- French fries are made from potatoes. tree →
- A potato with green skin should not be eaten. tree →
- Don't be a couch potato, go outside and play! tree →
- She put a great potato into his hand. tree →
note
A thing counted or weighed. Plural is «potatoes». Trap: «kg of potatoes» counts weight, not the number of potatoes. Potato is a vegetable; botanically it is a stem, not a root. Safety: green parts and sprouts of potatoes are mildly poisonous; do not eat them raw.
In the corpora
- Not everything under the ground is a root, though: a potato is a swollen stem, and its eyes are buds.
- A potato is a swollen underground stem called a tuber, and its eyes are buds; a sweet potato really is a root.
- Green potatoes and potato sprouts contain a mild poison, so they should not be eaten.
- Before 1492 Italy had no tomatoes, Ireland had no potatoes and nobody in Europe had tasted chocolate or chilli.
- In cartoons potatoes grow on trees and carrots wink from bushes.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «potato» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.