Scheme Meaning
/skiːm/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
nounAn artful deviation from the ordinary arrangement of words.
nounA representation of the aspects of the celestial bodies for any moment or at a given event.
Sentence Examples
Your scheme is like a house built on the sand.
Your help is indispensable for the success of the scheme.
The scheme has been set up to help homeless people.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The government's new ____ aims to reduce pollution by half in ten years.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The council approved a new housing ____ to provide affordable homes for local families.
Word Origin & History
From late Middle English scheame, from Medieval Latin schēma (“figure, form”), from Ancient Greek σχῆμα (skhêma, “form, shape”), from ἔχω (ékhō, “to hold”). Doublet of schema. Compare sketch.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"a blue case, from which was drawn a scheme of nativity"
— 1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Archibald Constable and Co., […], →OCLC:
"The stoical scheme of supplying our wants by lopping off our desires, is like cutting off our feet when we want shoes."
— c. 1713, Jonathan Swift, Thoughts on Various Subjects:
"Originally the opening had doubtless marked the projection of another road, but the scheme had come to nothing."
— 1923, Ernest Bramah, The Eyes of Max Carrados:
"There are schemes to transfer electrical energy from braking trains into local power grids, and even more radical plans for “moving platforms” that dock with high-speed trains. […] A “moving platform” scheme proposed by Priestmangoode is more technologically ambitious than maglev trains even though it relies on conventional rails. Local trains would use side-by-side rails to roll alongside intercity trains and allow passengers to switch trains by stepping through docking bays. This set-up solves several problems […]."
— 2013 June 1, “Ideas coming down the track”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, archived from the original on 11 Mar 2023, page 13 (Technology Quarterly):
"Such [rural solar plant] schemes are of little help to industry or other heavy users of electricity. Nor is solar power yet as cheap as the grid. For all that, the rapid arrival of electric light to Indian villages is long overdue. When the national grid suffers its next huge outage, as it did in July 2012 when hundreds of millions were left in the dark, look for specks of light in the villages."
— 2013 July 20, “Out of the gloom”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845, archived from the original on 12 Mar 2023:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The government's new ____ aims to reduce pollution by half in ten years.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The council approved a new housing ____ to provide affordable homes for local families.