Irregular Plural Nouns

Irregular Plural Nouns exercise

• What are plural and irregular plural nouns?

  Hints

  The word irregular means something that is not regular and does not follow the rules. Irregular nouns must be changed in different ways than regular nouns.

  An example of a regular plural noun is :

  • dog -> dogs

  An example of an irregular plural noun is:

  • person -> people

  Solution

  A plural noun is a noun that refers to more than one person, place, thing or idea.

  An irregular plural noun must be changed in a different way to make them mean more than one. They do not follow the rules, so we must memorise them.

• What is the irregular plural form of child?

  Hints

  Look at the picture. There was one child and now there is a group of _______ .

  The plural of child does not end in s.

  Solution

  The irregular plural form of child is children.

• Which words stay the same regardless of how many there are?

  Hints

  Remember, you are highlighting words that stay the same. For example, the word deer. We use deer when talking about one deer, or many deer.

  Try saying the words out loud in a sentence.

  For example: I saw one child, I saw many children.

  With this, we can see that children changes its form from regular to irregular. So, children does not stay the same.

  There are 3 words to highlight.

  Solution

  The words that stay the same regardless of whether the noun is one or more are:

  sheep, moose and fish.

  These words are used to talk about one, or many. For example:

  Look at this little sheep! We are talking about one sheep.

  Look at all these sheep! We are talking about many sheep.

  _______________________________________________________

  The other words on the list all change:

  Child changes to children.

  Woman changes to women.

  Man changes to men.

  Goose changes to geese.

• Match the pairs.

  Hints

  Remember the patterns that some irregular plural nouns follow. Look at this picture to help you.

  Remember that some plural nouns are the same in irregular form. For example: I saw one sheep. I saw many sheep.

  Solution

  The irregular plural of octopus is octopi.

  The irregular plural of goose is geese

  The irregular plural of rice is still rice.

  The irregular plural of person is people.

  The irregular plural of mouse is mice.

• What is the irregular plural form of foot?

  Hints

  The word foot changes to an irregular plural noun by using this pattern.

  Another example of this pattern is tooth changing to teeth. What does foot change to?

  Solution

  The irregular plural of foot is feet. This word changes vowels from oo to ee.

• Can you complete the sentences with the correct irregular plural nouns?

  Hints

  Use this chart to remind you of how we can identify the irregular plural form of a noun.

  You are one child in your class but altogether there are many _____ .

  Solution

  There are seven fish.

  I brush my teeth with a toothbrush.

  I play with the other children in my class.