noun, verb ·Uncommon ·College level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   An unloving succession of critical remarks, such as those directed by a parent towards a misbehaving child; an earful; dressing down.
2. 2
   rebuking a person harshly wordnet

Verb

1. 1
   present participle and gerund of scold form-of, gerund, participle, present

Synonyms

All synonyms

chidingabuseadmonishmentadmonitionbeefbeefing

Example

More examples

"The scolding I gave to the other children doesn't apply to you."

Etymology

From scold + -ing.

Related phrases

scolding stool

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.