The ESL HELP! Desk

Welcome to Our Online English Grammar HELP! Student Handbook!

Today's activities concern nouns and pronouns. This lesson is for beginners and intermediate learners of English. 

We begin with written activities.  You can print out the exercises below and complete them.

After you complete the activities and when you are ready to check your answers, go to our "Answer Key" shelf located in "Our Library".

In our Library, under Podcasts, you can locate the lesson One, Two, Three Little Countable Nouns. You may want to review that lesson before you begin today with the exercises.

 

1-1 Countable Nouns

What is a countable noun?

We can categorize nouns into two types:  countable and noncountable.

A countable noun is a noun that can be counted. 

Most common nouns are countable.  For example, the word friend is countable because you can count one friend, two friends, three friends, etc.

A countable noun has a singular form (e.g. friend) and a plural form (e.g. friends).

1-2    Singular Countable Nouns

     

In each example below, the noun is countable. Also, the writer is referring to one unit so the noun form must be singular.

Let's learn about some of the characteristics of a singular countable noun.

Notice that each singular countable noun has an article (a, an, the) preceding it in the noun determiner position.

(*   preceding - before or in front of)

(** the noun determiner position is the place before the noun where we usually place the word a, an, or the, any words that tell us that a noun is coming up soon.)

           This is the only beach that there is.
                             singular countable noun

           When that happens, of course I do not get a good grade.
                                                                                                     singular countable noun
       

Let's try this basic exercise before we move on to Plural Countable Nouns.

Exercise 3

Do the following for each noun phrase in the two sentences below:
1) identify the article and
2) identify the countable singular noun. 

1) This is the only beach that there is.

2) When that happens, of course I do not get a good grade.

You will find the answers in our "Answer Key".

We continue to Plural Countable Nouns.

So from the ESL Help Desk, thanks for dropping by this week and remember to email us your questions about English grammar by sending your comments through our blog.

 

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