Countable and Uncountable Nouns

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Countable and Uncountable Nouns

Understanding the difference between countable and uncountable nouns is an important element of language arts. Mastering these differences is a building block to more advanced language skills and may improve performance in other subjects, as language skills are necessary for all learning. Turtle Diary's Countable & Uncountable Nouns interactive basketball game provides short and varied exercises to keep children engaged and interested. The activity is kid-friendly and uses everyday examples of countable and uncountable nouns making it easy for the children to understand. The basketball theme makes learning especially fun for the sports lover and children who enjoy interactive play.

Countable and uncountable nouns are two different types of nouns that help to form a solid subject in a sentence.

Countable Nouns

Countable nouns are those that you can actually count. If you can put an article in front of the noun, such as a, an, or the, then it is countable.

They come in two forms: singular & plural. Let’s explore these a bit further…

Singular Nouns work with articles, such as a or an to indicate one item.

Plural nouns are more than one singular item, and you can give it a number. In order to form a plural noun, you add an s to the end of the word. But it does get a bit more complicated than that, because there are some specific ways to pluralize nouns based on their endings.

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Making singular nouns into plural nouns often gets tricky, because there are certain spelling rules you need to follow. Take a look here for the most common spelling rules, and commit them to memory:

Noun Ending Spelling Rule Example
Most nounsadd S cat ➤ cats
dog ➤ dogs
pancake ➤ pancakes
Ends in s, z, x, sh, or chadd ES class ➤ classes
waltz ➤ waltzes
box ➤ boxes
dish ➤ dishes
church ➤ churches
Ends in consonant followed by yChange Y to I and add ESberry ➤ berries
baby ➤ babies
sky ➤ skies
Ends in vowel followed by yadd Sessay ➤ essays
day ➤ days
Ends in consonant followed by oadd EShero ➤ heroes
tomato ➤ tomatoes
Ends in vowel followed by oadd Srodeo ➤ rodeos
studio ➤ studios
Ends in f or feChange F or FE to V, & add ESshelf ➤ shelves
knife ➤ knives
Ends in usChange US to Ioctopus ➤ octopi
fungus ➤ fungi

Uncountable Nouns

Uncountable nouns are things you cannot quantify, like feelings or emotions or abstract concepts. In general, you can divide these into mass and abstract.

They come in two forms: singular & plural. Let’s explore these a bit further…

Mass nouns are groups of items like a group, a liquid, a gas, an activity, or a collection. Even though they may seem to represent more than one item, mass noun are singular, like the group or collection that they represent.

For example, you wouldn’t say, “I need four furnitures.” Furniture is a singular group that represents all different kinds of furniture, like chairs, beds, tables, etc.

Abstract nouns are concepts, ideas, thoughts, and feelings.

Here are some examples of uncountable nouns divided by type:
Mass Nouns Abstract Nouns
rain, snow, sleet, hail, windIntelligence, stupidity, cunning
butter, flour, milk, sugar, waterinformation, morality, patience
furniture, lumber, gold, silverbeauty, horror, growth, happiness
Singing, reading, fishing, bakingneed, loss, love, luck, shock
air, hydrogen, oxygen, radon, carbon dioxideright, opinion, dream, belief, anger
water, coffee, tea, winehappiness, hope, mercy, self-control

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Remember you CANNOT use an article like a or an in front of a noncount noun.

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