kinder

Pluralkinders

1. 1
   adjective

   Comparative of kind.

   She grew kinder as she got older.

   Volunteers are often kinder than they strictly need to be.

   Note

   An ordinary comparative built with -er, the usual pattern for a short adjective like kind, rather than with more. It most often takes to: kinder to me, kinder to the track. Nigel Harris's phrase in RAIL (2021), that electric trains are kinder to the track, stretches the gentle sense of kind to machines and materials. The same spelling also covers a German-born word for children and two clippings of kindergarten, all unrelated.

2. 2
   adverbcolloquial

   Alternative form of kinda: a nonstandard spelling that imitates casual speech.

   He sounded kinder annoyed when he finally answered the phone.

   It was kinder dark by the time we left the house.

   Note

   A respelling of kind of that shows how the phrase sounds when spoken quickly. It sits before an adjective and softens it. James Jackson's Tom Terror, the Outlaw (1882) has a speaker who is "kinder glad", and Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express (1934) has someone "kinder reticent", both in dialogue. Despite the -er ending, it has nothing to do with the comparative of kind and cannot itself be compared.

3. 3
   nounPhilippinescountable or uncountableabbreviationclipping

   Clipping of kindergarten.

   The children spend most of kinder playing and singing songs.

   Most kids begin kinder around the age of four.

   Note

   Philippine English shortens kindergarten to kinder. In the Philippines, kindergarten covers the two levels between nursery and prep, which are the second and third years of preschool. Like school, the word often takes no article (start kinder, in kinder), but it can also be counted when it names a class or a place.

4. 4
   nouncolloquialcountableabbreviationclipping

   Clipping of kindergartner.

   A nervous kinder clung to her mother at the classroom door.

   The teacher walked the new kinder down to the nurse's office.

   Note

   Here the word names a person, so it counts like any ordinary noun: one kinder, two kinders. That plural is the easiest way to tell it apart from the humorous word for children, which is already plural and never adds an -s. It shares its origin with the school-level clipping, and it belongs to informal speech rather than careful writing.

5. 5
   nounhumorousplural

   Children, referred to in a humorous or playful way.

   By bedtime the kinder had worn out every adult in the house.

   He herded the kinder into the car for the long drive.

   Similarkids, kiddies, children, youngsters

   Note

   A loan from German Kinder, "children," which sometimes reached English through Yiddish. It appears playfully or in German and Yiddish settings. The word is plural only: you can round up the kinder, but there is no "a kinder" for a single child in this sense. It nearly always comes with the, as a fond, slightly mock-grand way to refer to the children of a household or a family outing.

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