Lingoflyආහාරයට ගන්නවා
- ආහාරයට ගන්නවාāhārayaṭa gannavāto feed on
“ආහාරයට ගන්නවා” (āhārayaṭa gannavā) — to feed on in Sinhala. Verb, level B1. Literally 'to take as food': the food word is bookish. Kanavā, 'to eat', serves an animal too, but in nature stories this turn is taken. In a live sentence: “අලි ගස් කොළ ආහාරයට ගන්නවා” (ali gas koḷa āhārayaṭa gannavā) — Elephants feed on tree leaves. You can hear how it sounds right here. Written with the characters ආ, හ, ා, ර, ය, ට, ග, න, ්, න, ව, ා.
In short
| Written in Sinhala | ආහාරයට ගන්නවා (āhārayaṭa gannavā) |
| Read in Latin letters | āhārayaṭa gannavā |
| Translation | to feed on |
| Part of speech | verb |
| Level | B1 |
Why it looks that way
Literally 'to take as food': the food word is bookish. Kanavā, 'to eat', serves an animal too, but in nature stories this turn is taken
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- අලි ගස් කොළ ආහාරයට ගන්නවාali gas koḷa āhārayaṭa gannavāElephants feed on tree leaves
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “to feed on” in Sinhala?
«ආහාරයට ගන්නවා» (āhārayaṭa gannavā), read “āhārayaṭa gannavā”. In a live sentence: “අලි ගස් කොළ ආහාරයට ගන්නවා” (ali gas koḷa āhārayaṭa gannavā) — Elephants feed on tree leaves. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Verb, level B1; written with the characters ආ, හ, ා, ර, ය, ට, ග, න, ්, න, ව, ා.
How is “ආහාරයට ගන්නවා” (āhārayaṭa gannavā) written in Latin letters?
āhārayaṭa gannavā. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Literally 'to take as food': the food word is bookish. Kanavā, 'to eat', serves an animal too, but in nature stories this turn is taken. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how this sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.