windmill

«windmill» in Mova's school dictionary: a building with large sails that the wind turns to grind… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 2 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

part of speech

noun (a windmill, windmills); verb (windmill, windmills, windmilled — rare, to swing arms round)

meaning for a pupil

1) A windmill is a building with large sails that the wind turns to grind grain or pump water. tree →

2) A windmill is also a modern tall tower with blades that makes electricity (more exactly a wind turbine). tree →

3) A windmill is a toy on a stick with paper or plastic blades that spin in the wind (UK: a pinwheel or windmill). tree →

sense in the lessons

Used in science and energy lessons (renewable energy, wind power), history (flour mills, the Netherlands), and stories («Don Quixote tilting at windmills»).

examples

• The old windmill ground wheat into flour. tree →
• The Netherlands is famous for its windmills. tree →
• Windmills on the farm pump water for the cattle. tree →
• The hills are covered with modern windmills making electricity. tree →
• We made a paper windmill in science. tree →
• The sails of the windmill turned slowly. tree →
• Wind power is a clean source of energy. tree →
• A windmill stood upon the hill, proud to look at, and it was proud too. tree →

note

Compound: wind + mill. Strictly, machines that make electricity are «wind turbines», but people often call them windmills. In America a toy windmill is a «pinwheel».

In the corpora

• Windmills and watermills once ground grain between big stones; today most flour is made in huge roller mills.
• A wind turbine is a giant windmill.

Trees and pragmatics

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