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approach
in a sentence
grouped by contextual meaning

approach as in:  approached the city

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Winter is approaching.
approaching = getting nearer
Show 3 more with this contextual meaning
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    I grow more nervous as the test approaches.
    approaches = gets nearer
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    Walking past the moose bones, I approach the vehicle and step through an emergency exit at the back.  (source)
    approach = come near
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    Roy was feeling pretty homesick for Montana when he heard the approach of a siren outside.  (source)
    approach = coming nearer
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Show 10 more with 10 word variations
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    But he was more and more apprehensive as his own approached.  (source)
    approached = came near
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    Now and then a mall worker would try to approach him with a tidbit.  (source)
    approach = get near
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    In the east the sky was smoky gray, and I was glad for the approaching dawn.  (source)
    approaching = coming
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    She is with child, and her time approaches.  (source)
    approaches = comes near
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    Surely it was mostly his grief over losing Mother that made him so unapproachable.†  (source)
    unapproachable = unable to get closer to
    standard prefix: The prefix "un-" in unapproachable means not and reverses the meaning of approachable. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
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    Not so grand as the Station Master, but more approachable — less powerful than the old gentleman, but more confidential.†  (source)
    approachable = able to get nearer
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    20 So the carle that is young, by kindnesses rendered The friends of his father, with fees in abundance Must be able to earn that when age approacheth Eager companions aid him requitingly, When war assaults him serve him as liegemen: 25 By praise-worthy actions must honor be got 'Mong all of the races.†  (source)
    approacheth = gets closer to
    standard suffix: Today, the suffix "-eth" is replaced by "-s", so that where they said "She approacheth" in older English, today we say "She approaches."
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    I fear not, unapproached in might, A thousand Ráva?'†  (source)
    unapproached = not having gotten closer to
    standard prefix: The prefix "un-" in unapproached means not and reverses the meaning of approached. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
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    MEPHISTOPHELES Since thou, O Lord, approachest us once more, And how it fares with us, to ask art fain, Since thou hast kindly welcom'd me of yore, Thou see'st me also now among thy train.†  (source)
    approachest = get closer to
    standard suffix: Today, the suffix "-est" is dropped, so that where they said "Thou approachest" in older English, today we say "You approach."
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    But there mingled with it a certain mild audacity, born of the occasion and of a sense, probably, of Newman's unprecedented approachableness, and, beyond this, a vague indifference to the old proprieties; as if my lady's own woman had at last begun to reflect that, since my lady had taken another person, she had a slight reversionary property in herself.†  (source)
    approachableness = the quality of being able to get closer to something
    standard suffix: The suffix "-ness" converts an adjective to a noun that means the quality of. This is the same pattern you see in words like darkness, kindness, and coolness.
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approach as in:  use the best approach

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    We need to approach this problem in a new way.
    approach = do (something in a particular way)
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    Maybe the best approach is to get him talking.  (source)
    approach = technique (way of doing something)
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    I'd learned by then that a direct approach, 'By God, you better not try a stunt like that again!', didn't work with Chris.  (source)
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Show 10 more with 4 word variations
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    He tried another approach.  (source)
    approach = technique (way of doing something)
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    We have had different approaches to agriculture, to monetary union, to defence.  (source)
    approaches = ways of doing something
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    But Lamar, the learned scholar and professor, approached the issue somewhat differently than his colleagues.  (source)
    approached = handled (did something in a particular manner)
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    Skeletons of card soldiers and chessmen littered the dusty hall approaching the South Dining Room.  (source)
    approaching = leading to
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    I wanted to warn him. "Phoebe and I saw her slashing and hacking away at the bushes in her backyard." "Is there something wrong with that?" he asked. I tried another approach. "Her voice is like dead leaves blowing around, and her hair is spooky."  (source)
    approach = way of doing something
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    The approaches to the monorail station were black with the ant-like pullulation of lower-caste activity.  (source)
    approaches = routes that lead to a particular place
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    Had I approached my discovery in a more noble spirit, had I risked the experiment while under the empire of generous or pious aspirations, all must have been otherwise, and from these agonies of death and birth, I had come forth an angel instead of a fiend.  (source)
    approached = handled (done something in a particular manner)
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    I suspect I'm approaching her on the wrong level. No matter what I try to discuss with her, I am unable to communicate.  (source)
    approaching = communicating in a particular way
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    They stalled their ship while turning from base leg onto landing approach.  (source)
    approach = route (way to get somewhere)
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    So Nestor held his throne and scepter now, lord of the western approaches to Akhaia.  (source)
    approaches = roads leading
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approach as in:  approached her with the proposal

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They approached her about becoming a member of the committee.
approached = began communication with
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    I approached three bankers about a loan.
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    However, please be aware that if you choose not to accept our proposal, we intend to approach each of your competitors. At the very least, we hope you'll do us the honor of being the first to hear our generous offer.  (source)
    approach = make a proposal
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    The Count had not much cause to interact with children, but he had been raised well enough to know that a child should not idly approach a stranger, should not interrupt him in the middle of a meal, and certainly should not ask him questions about his personal appearance.  (source)
    approach = begin communication with
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Show 10 more with 5 word variations
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    While he tried to decide on the best way to approach his request, the goblin broke the silence.  (source)
    approach = speak with someone about
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    But Hammond had approached Wu with a directness Wu never forgot.  (source)
    approached = begun talking with
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    He walks up and down the platform, approaching every disembarking woman.  (source)
    approaching = beginning communication
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    "It must be because you're so approachable," I say flatly. "You know. Like a bed of nails."  (source)
    approachable = easy to talk to
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    As the question had no bearing, near or remote, on any foregone or subsequent transaction, I consider it to have been thrown out, like her previous approaches, in general conversational condescension.  (source)
    approaches = ways of engaging someone in conversation
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    We approach a great man through his servants.  (source)
    approach = begin communication with
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    Once the persecution began, his work slowly dried up. ... He approached an old faithful named Herbert Bollinger—a man with a hemispheric waistline who spoke Hochdeutsch (he was from Hamburg)—when he saw him on Munich Street. At first, the man looked down, past his girth, to the ground, but when his eyes returned to the painter, the question clearly made him uncomfortable.  (source)
    approached = began communicating (about a delicate topic) with
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    In many families, she had learned, one dress such as these would be handed down through three generations as a cherished possession. Surely in Hartford, or perhaps even here in Wethersfield, she would find willing buyers, even though she had not yet worked out a plan for approaching them.  (source)
    approaching = speaking with someone about something for the first time
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    This Keeper seemed a lot more approachable.  (source)
    approachable = easy to begin talking with
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    She decided to make her approach. Standing in front of Saeed's father she proceeded to talk animatedly with a friend while ignoring the object of her desire. He noticed her. He listened to her. He summoned the nerve to speak to her.  (source)
    approach = to begin communication with someone for the first time
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rare meaning

Show 3 with this contextual meaning
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    I ate the fried pig skins, danced, screamed and drank the extra-sweet and sticky Coca-Cola with the nearest approach to abandonment I had ever experienced.†  (source)
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    The nearest approach to decoration was a number of wooden panels with sayings, mostly from Repentances, artistically burnt into them.†  (source)
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    The nearest approach to it in reality—the man who lives to serve others—is the slave.†  (source)
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    When she had brought up a cup of hot tea and a hot brick, rolled in flannel, she looked down at Scarlett and said, with the nearest approach to an apology in her voice Scarlett had ever heard: "Lamb, huccome you din' tell yo' own Mammy whut you wuz upter?†  (source)
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    That was the nearest approach to independence a man could make "under capitalism," he explained; he would never marry, for no sane man would allow himself to fall in love until after the revolution.†  (source)
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    This was the nearest approach Henchard could make to the full truth.†  (source)
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    This was the nearest approach I could get to Harvard and to the fulfillment of my childish declaration.†  (source)
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    The nearest approach to her was a Unitarian minister from Boston, who very soon demanded a separation, for incompatibility of temper.†  (source)
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    "My Caroline," he would say, making the nearest approach that he could to bending over her.†  (source)
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    Perhaps the nearest approach to the latter that Hetty had manifested was to be seen in the sensitiveness which had caused her to detect March's predilection for her sister, for, among Judith's many admirers, this was the only instance in which the dull mind of the girl had been quickened into an observation of the circumstances.†  (source)
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    No vair or ermine decked this garment; but in respect of his age, the Grand Master, as permitted by the rules, wore his doublet lined and trimmed with the softest lambskin, dressed with the wool outwards, which was the nearest approach he could regularly make to the use of fur, then the greatest luxury of dress.†  (source)
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    Endnote 144: From this and other passages in the "Odyssey" it appears that we are in an age anterior to the use of coined money—an age when cauldrons, tripods, swords, cattle, chattels of all kinds, measures of corn, wine, or oil, etc. etc., not to say pieces of gold, silver, bronze, or even iron, wrought more or less, but unstamped, were the nearest approach to a currency that had as yet been reached.†  (source)
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    Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation—the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks.†  (source)
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