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Glite Dictionary
🎡 A spinning toy 🛞 A wheel with pins 🎆 A spinning firework 🪴 A rosette plant
pinwheel

pinwheel

1 2.7
A small toy with colored blades on a stick that spins in the wind
  • noun
  • /ˈpɪnˌwiːl/
translation icon : molinete
  • The children giggled as they ran around with colorful pinwheels on a windy day.
  • a spinning pinwheel
  • a colorful pinwheel
  • hold a pinwheel

Isn't that like the little windy thing pinwheel?

Examples

  • Make several of these pinwheels and glue them to the photo frame in an asymmetrical pattern.

    Blog text (29)

  • She enjoys hearing their playful screams and recalls her father letting her hold a carnival pinwheel out the window of their two-door compact.

    Fiction book (2002)

  • A colorful pinwheel spins in the damp breeze.

    Fiction book (1996)

  • The pinwheels strung above the station cranked, orbiting in the sky with the first stars.

    Fiction book (1991)

  • At any other moment, Summer would have been most appreciative of the hot magenta and neon orange pinwheels swirling across the western third of the sky.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • At the craft fair, many kids were excited to decorate their own pinwheels with stickers and markers.

  • As the breeze picked up, the pinwheels in the garden spun joyfully, adding a burst of color to the landscape.

Synonyms

spinner
vspinwheel
  • Informal
1 3.2

A small toy you turn quickly with your fingers for fun or to help you focus

is a lightweight vane toy on a stick activated by the wind
whirly
vspinwheel
1 8.4

A small toy that spins quickly in the wind

is a vane toy on a stick that turns when wind blows
whirligig
vspinwheel
8.6

A small toy that spins quickly on a point like a top

is made of vanes on a stick and spins only when wind moves it

Compounds

pinwheel flower
  • Indian
9.9

A tropical shrub with shiny leaves and sweet-smelling night flowers with wavy petals

pinwheel roll
5.1

A sweet baked roll shaped like a pinwheel filled with jam and cinnamon sugar

How Fast

spinner
  • Informal
1 3.2
whirly
1 8.4
top
81 1.8
pinwheel
1 2.7
whirligig
8.5

Surface Forms

pinwheel singular
pinwheels plural

Morphology

pinwheel = pin + wheel (transparent) = pin + wheel

A straightforward compound of 'pin' + 'wheel'; the toy is a spinning wheel-like object typically mounted on a pin, so the meaning follows directly from the parts.

Etymology

Pinwheel comes from the very plain parts pin and wheel: a small 'pin' holds a flat wheel of paper or plastic so the wind can make it turn. So a pinwheel toy is a little wheel that spins when you hold it in the breeze.