A noun is said to be singular (or in the singular number) if it refers to one person or thing.
A noun is said to be plural (or in the plural number) if it refers to more than one person or thing.
The nouns girl, doll, bus, knife, baby, photo are singular.
The nouns girls, dolls, buses, knives, babies, photos are plural.
Given below are few rules that we have to observe while changing nouns from
In most cases we add -s to the singular form to make plurals.
e.g. book books, boy boys.
Nouns ending in a hissing sound, i.e. nouns ending in -s, -ss, sh, -ch and -x, we add -es to the singular form.
e.g. gas gases, class classes, bush bushes, bench benches, fox foxes etc.
Nouns ending in –o, if they have a consonant before them generally, we add –es to to the singular form.
e.g. mango mangoes, tomato tomatoes etc.
Nouns ending in –f and –fe form their plurals by changing the –f or –fe into –ves
e.g. calf calves, life lives, wolf wolves etc.
If a noun ends with a –y and the –y has a consonant before it, its plural is formed by changing the –y into –ies
e.g. army armies, baby babies, story stories etc.
A few nouns form their plurals by a change of the inside vowel as :
e.g. foot feet, goose geese, woman women etc.
One word can often express the idea of a phrase or a clause and can help in writing or communicating precisely. List of some common one-word substitutions are given below. Please learn it to improve your word power.
| Phrase | One Word Substitution |
| A place where prisoners are kept | Jail |
| The area over which an official has control | Jurisdiction |
| Anything which relates to young and youth | Juvenile |
| An animal of Australia with great leaping power | Kangaroo |
| To carry away a person forcibly | Kidnap |
| A school for small children | Kindergarten |
| An abnormal desire to steal | Kleptomania |
| That which is lawful | Legal |
| One who knows many languages | Linguist |
| A kind of winged insect migrating in swarms and consuming vegetation. | Locust |
| The science of reasoning | Logic |
| A continuous talker | Loquacious |
| Eclipse of Moon | Lunar |
| The first speech made by a person, an unmarried woman | Maiden |
| Animals which give milk | Mammals |
| Handwritten book | Manuscript |
| A person who died for the sake of his country | Martyr |
| The tendency to derive sexual gratification from one’s own pain or humiliation | Masochism |
| One for whom money is the most important thing | Materialistic |
| A cinema show which is held in the afternoon | Matinee |
| Morning prayer in Church | Matins |
| Killing of one’s own mother; killer of one’s own mother | Matricide |