soil
part of speech
noun (soil — uncountable; soils — kinds of soil); verb (soil, soils, soiled — to make dirty)
meaning for a pupil
1) The top layer of the ground in which plants grow, made of tiny bits of rock, dead plants and animals, water and air. tree →
2) Land or country: «on British soil». tree →
3) Verb: to make something dirty (formal). tree →
sense in the lessons
In science: soil forms slowly from broken rock and rotting plants; worms and tiny living things make it rich; kinds: sandy, clay, loamy; plants take water and minerals from soil through roots; compost makes soil better. In safety: wash hands after gardening — soil can have germs. Phrases: rich soil, sandy soil, clay soil, soil and water, topsoil, garden soil, soil erosion.
examples
- Plants grow in soil. tree →
- Earthworms make the soil healthy. tree →
- Sandy soil lets water drain quickly. tree →
- Clay soil is sticky when it's wet. tree →
- Wash your hands after touching soil. tree →
- We put compost in the soil to help the vegetables. tree →
- Tree roots hold the soil in place. tree →
- The soil was dry because it hadn't rained. tree →
- He looked, and saw peasants tilling the soil. tree →
note
Mostly uncountable: «some soil». Similar words: dirt (US, everyday), earth, ground. Soil is not just dirt: it is full of life. Soil takes hundreds of years to form, so protecting it matters.
In the corpora
- Soil gives plants water, grip for their roots and minerals such as nitrogen; without minerals plants grow small and yellow.
- Hard deer hooves grip soil and snow but slip on smooth ice, so real deer avoid frozen ponds where they can.
- Buttress roots spread out like walls around many rainforest trees and hold the tall tree up in thin soil.
- Mangrove roots break waves and hold the soil, and after the 2004 tsunami, places with mangroves often had less damage.
- Here is the surprise: a huge oak does not eat soil to grow.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «soil» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.