supervision
Americannoun
-
supervisions
plural
Usage
What does supervision mean? Supervision is the act of overseeing or watching over someone or something. Supervision is the noun form of the verb supervise, meaning to oversee or watch over. You can supervise a project, but most of the time supervision means supervising people, especially parents supervising their children or a manager or supervisor supervising their employees. Someone or something being supervised is said to be under supervision. When it’s used in the context of adults watching children, the word often appears in the phrases parental supervision and adult supervision. Children or other people who can’t be left alone are said to need constant supervision. Example: All children in this building must be under adult supervision.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of supervision
1615–25; < Medieval Latin supervīsiōn- (stem of supervīsiō ) oversight, equivalent to super- super- + vīsiōn- vision
Explanation
When you keep an eye on someone, that's supervision. Small children require supervision when they're swimming, and a middle school math class needs supervision while they're taking a quiz. To watch over and keep people (or animals) safe, or to watch and manage them while they work, is to supervise them. The act of doing this is supervision. If your boss lets you work without supervision, that means that she doesn't feel the need to observe you while you get your job done. Supervision and supervise stem from the Latin roots super, "over," and videre, "to see."
Vocabulary lists containing supervision
myPerspectives 7.1
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Employment, List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“And so whatever any part of the Federal Reserve does, if they slip up, if they stumble on supervision or on payments, that reflects on our institutional credibility,” said Warsh.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 16, 2026
The boy was granted conditional bail and must not contact the alleged victims or witnesses, must not be alone with girls under 16 without supervision, and must work with the Youth Justice Service.
From BBC ● Oct. 9, 2026
The first line of defense, Georgieva said, is regulation and supervision.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 7, 2026
Agentic AI, in particular, will be central to software development, Huang said, referring to systems programmed to be autonomous and perform tasks without supervision.
From Barron's ● Oct. 7, 2026
She reported that she “fully understood the practical difficulties most women had to contend with...the chaotic conditions into which everything fell without her constant supervision, and the wearied, anxious look of the majority of women.”
From "Votes for Women!" by Winifred Conkling
Xi was quoted as saying China would crack down on corrupt behaviour related to disorderly capital expansion and platform monopolies, and would strengthen supervisions.
From Reuters ● Apr. 30, 2022
His scheme was to devise his own corrective biography, ostensibly with Miller as authorized author, while behind the scenes Roth would, in effect, ghostwrite it with proddings and minute supervisions of method and means.
From New York Times ● Apr. 1, 2021
Garriott said Taylor-Silva’s case motivates her to put extra effort into the difficult supervisions.
From Washington Times ● Aug. 5, 2017
That usually leaves the children with no federal supervisions once they are released to sponsors — where they are often prime recruiting targets.
From Washington Times ● Jun. 21, 2017
And while there are heads of departments who oversee the work of clerks and stenographers up to a point, almost daily conferences and supervisions are necessary in order to have the work go on satisfactorily.
From The Torch Bearer A Look Forward and Back at the Woman's Journal, the Organ of the Woman's Movement by Agnes E. Ryan
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
