Singular and Plural Nouns

Singular and Plural Nouns
We use a singular nouns to show only one person, animal, thing or place
Examples : a teacher a car a school a zebra

We use a plural nouns to show more than one person, animal, thing or place
Examples : two boys three glasses ten bears five shops

A plural noun can be formed in many ways
a) by adding ‘-s’
Examples :
cat – cats
ruler – rulers
toy – toys
house – houses
insect – insects
sock – socks
room - rooms
zebra - zebras

b) by adding ‘-es’ to words ending in ‘-sh’, ‘-ch’, ‘-ss’ and ‘-x’
brush – brushes
class – classes
box – boxes
buffalo – buffaloes
branch – branches
dish – dishes

c) by changing ‘y’ into ‘ies’, if a noun ends in ‘-y’ preceded by a consonant.
baby – babies
lady – ladies
city – cities
puppy – puppies
lorry – lorries


d) by changing ‘-f’ or ‘-fe’ into ‘-ves’
leaf – leaves
knife – knives
thief – thieves
wife – wives
fox – foxes
calf – calves

e) by changing the inside vowels of some words
man – men
goose – geese
tooth – teeth
woman – women

f) some nouns have the same singular and plural nouns
sheep – sheep
deer – deer
fish –fish
furniture – furniture