yarn
part of speech
noun (yarn, yarns); verb (yarn, yarns, yarned, yarning — informal, Australia/NZ)
meaning for a pupil
1) Yarn is long thread made of wool, cotton or other fibre, used for knitting, crocheting and weaving. tree →
2) (informal) A yarn is a long story, often one that is exciting or not quite true. tree →
3) (informal, Australia/NZ) A yarn is a chat; to yarn means to talk for a while in a friendly way. tree →
sense in the lessons
In crafts lessons and stories yarn is what you knit with; a ball of yarn has a length that maths problems may share between people. In stories, «spin a yarn» means to tell a long, perhaps made-up tale. In Australian and New Zealand speech, «have a yarn» means have a chat. Phrases: «a ball of yarn», «spin a yarn», «have a yarn».
examples
- Gran bought blue yarn to knit me a scarf. tree →
- The kitten played with a ball of yarn. tree →
- A ball of yarn is 60 metres long; how many 4-metre pieces can you cut? tree →
- Grandpa spun us a yarn about a giant fish. tree →
- Come over and have a yarn with us, mate. (Australia) tree →
- We sat on the porch yarning till dark. (Australia/NZ) tree →
- The rug is woven from thick wool yarn. tree →
- Habetrot soon overtook her, and placed the yarn in her hands. tree →
note
Yarn (thread) is usually uncountable: «some yarn», but «different yarns» for kinds. A story yarn is countable: «a yarn, yarns». Do not confuse with «yawn» (opening your mouth when tired).
In the corpora
- Toad: «You've been listening to some of the yarns they spin in the public-houses about here.
- To "spin a yarn" means to tell an invented story.
- Vedan and Javan traded with yarn for thy wares; massive iron, cassia, and calamus, were among thy merchandise.
- I have decked my couch with coverlets, with striped cloths of the yarn of Egypt.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «yarn» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.