From Theory to Practice: Nouns in English

From Theory to Practice (1)

Grammar is one of those issues that needs to be stressed with students to help them use it as a communicative resource to sound not only syntactically correct but also idiomatically right. Now that I am currently working with students who need to develop and consolidate their English-speaking skills to perform better in their future working fields, I will be posting regularly sample exercises in various areas of the English grammar.

The first sample activity that I created is the following one on nouns in English. Feel free to download it and use it to strengthen your learners’ communicative resource, -grammar.

From Theory to Practice

Nouns in English

Mass Noun: Nouns that can be pluralized and are always singular such as gases, fluids, natural phenomena, materials, academic fields, ideas, emotions, and behaviors.

Mass-to-Count Nouns: Certain mass nouns that shift to count ones when denoting a type, kind, unit, or serving.

Count Nouns: Nouns that can be either singular or plural, except in certain cases such as scissors that is always a plural count noun.

Collective Nouns: This is a subdivision of count nouns that when being used as subjects, they can take singular or plural verbs with a difference in meaning or intention on the side of the speaker.

1.   Classify the following nouns according to the categories below.

binder – difficulty – ethics – beer – ozone – book – beauty – milk – mouse – experience – oil – fish – CD – carbon dioxide – pen – wine – grass – cheese – scissors – rain – marker – helium – tea

Mass Nouns	Mass-to-Count Nouns	Count Nouns

2.   Which of the following have no singular forms? Supply the singular form in case it is possible.

	socks		beddings
	pants		slacks
	clothes		scissors
	shoes		jeans
	belongings		belt
	desks		briefs

3.   Complete the following phrases with “a unit or a serving of” or with a “collective noun.”

a)    a __________ of coffee b)   a __________ of deer c)    a __________ of chocolate d)   a __________ of lions e)    a __________ of pastry f)     a __________ of geese g)   a __________ of bread h)   a __________ of witches i)     a __________ of pizza j)     a __________ of wolves	loaf	band
	pack	cup
	coven	slice
	piece	pride
	bar	flock

From Theory to Practice: Nouns in English from jonacuso