Noticing

How to spell noticing

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce noticing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does noticing mean?

1. verbBecoming aware of something through observation; perceiving or paying attention to it.

Noticing in a sentence

• Without noticing the time, she worked straight through lunch.

• He kept noticing small errors in the spreadsheet that everyone else had missed.

Where does noticing come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This is the present participle of the verb 'notice', which itself grew out of the noun 'notice'. The noun arrived in English in the fifteenth century from Old French 'notice', which came directly from the Latin 'notitia', meaning 'a being known' or 'acquaintance', built on 'notus', the past participle of 'noscere', 'to come to know'. The same Latin root sits inside familiar relatives such as 'note', 'notion', and 'notable'. The verb sense, 'to take note of' or 'to observe', developed later, in the eighteenth century, from the noun. When the suffix '-ing' is added, the silent 'e' of 'notice' is dropped, which is the small spelling trap here: writers must remember 'noticing', not 'noticeing'.

How the word is built

• notice (to observe, from notice noun)
• -ing (present participle/gerund suffix); the silent final -e of notice is dropped before -ing