There are several nouns that have irregular plural forms.

Singular	Plural
fish	fish
sheep	sheep
barracks	barracks
foot	feet
tooth	teeth
goose	geese
tooth	teeth
goose	geese
child	children
man	men
woman	women
person	people
mouse	mice

Plurals formed in this way are sometimes called irregular plurals or mutated (or mutating) plurals.

• more than one child = children
• more than one woman = women
• more than one man = men
• more than one person = people
• more than one goose = geese
• more than one mouse = mice
• more than one barracks = barracks
• more than one deer = deer

Other irregular plural forms include the following:

Some foreign nouns retain their plural. (Note that some of them adapted the s of the English plural form!)

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
alga	algae
amoeba	amoebae	amoebas
antenna	antennae	antennas
formula	formulae	formulas
larva	larvae
nebula	nebulae	nebulas
vertebra	vertebrae

Nouns ending in us get a, i or the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
corpus	corpora
genus	genera
alumnus	alumni
bacillus	bacilli
cactus	cacti	cactuses
focus	foci
fungus	fungi	funguses
nucleus	nuclei
octopus	octopi	octopuses
radius	radii
stimulus	stimuli
syllabus	syllabi	syllabuses
terminus	termini

Nouns ending in um get a, i or the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
addendum	addenda
bacterium	bacteria
curriculum	curricula	curriculums
datum	data
erratum	errata
medium	media
memorandum	memoranda	memorandums
ovum	ova
stratum	strata
symposium	symposia	symposiums

Nouns ending in ex or ix get ices or get the s of the English plural:

Singular	Foreign plural	English plural
apex	apices	apexes
appendix	appendices	appendixes
cervix	cervices	cervixes
index	indices	indexes
matrix	matrices	matrixes
vortex	vortices

Nouns ending in is becoming es in plural:

Singular	Plural form
analysis	analyses
axis	axes
basis	bases
crisis	crises
diagnosis	diagnoses
emphasis	emphases
hypothesis	hypotheses
neurosis	neuroses
oasis	oases
parenthesis	parentheses
synopsis	synopses
thesis	theses

Nouns ending in -on becoming -a:

singular	plural
criterion	criteria
phenomenon	phenomena
automaton	automata

Nouns that are always singular:

A handful of nouns appear to be plural in form but take a singular verb:

• The news is bad.
• Gymnastics is fun to watch.
• Economics / mathematics / statistics is said to be difficult.

Some nouns never take the s of the plural and are always singular:

• your luggage / baggage is so heavy
• I'd like to buy new furniture for the house
• you can find more information in our website.

Different types of nouns

There are different types of nouns:

1. An abstract noun names an idea, event, quality, or concept (freedom, love, courage...) Concrete nouns name something recognizable through the sense (table, dog, house...)

2. Animate nouns refer to a person, animal, or other creature (man, elephant, chicken...) An inanimate noun refers to a material object (stone, wood, table...)

3. A collective noun describes a group of things or people as a unit (family, flock, audience...)

4. Common noun is the name of a group of similar things (table, book, window...) Proper nouns, however, refer to the name of a single person, place or thing (John, Joseph, London...)

5. Compound nouns refer to two or more nouns combined to form a single noun (sister-in-law, schoolboy, fruit juice)

6. Countable (or count) nouns have a singular and a plural form. In plural, these nouns can be used with a number- they can be counted. (friends, chairs, houses, boys...) Uncountable (or non count) nouns, however, can only be used in singular. They can't be counted. (money, bread, water, coffee...)

THERE IS - THERE ARE

We use there is and there are to say that something exists.

 

Positive Sentences

We use there is for singular and there are for plural.

• There is one table in the classroom.
• There are three chairs in the classroom.
• There is a spider in the bath.
• There are many people at the bus stop.

We also use There is with uncountable nouns:

• There is milk in the fridge.
• There is some sugar on the table.
• There is ice cream on your shirt.

 

Contractions

The contraction of there is is there's.

• There's a good song on the radio.
• There's only one chocolate left in the box.

You cannot contract there are.

• There are nine cats on the roof.
• There are only five weeks until my birthday.

 

Negative Form

The negative is formed by putting not after is or are:

• There is not a horse in the field.
• There are not eight children in the school.
• There is not a tree in the garden.
• There are not two elephants in the zoo.

We almost always use contractions when speaking.

The Negative contractions are:

• There's not = There isn't
• There are not = There aren't

 

There aren't with ANY

When we want to indicate that a zero quantity of something exists we use there aren't any.

• There aren't any people at the party.
• There aren't any trees in my street.

We also use this structure with uncountable nouns:

• There isn't any water in the swimming pool.
• There isn't any sugar in my coffee.

 

Questions

To form a question we place is / are in front of there.

Again we use any with plural questions or those which use uncountable nouns.

We also use there is / are in short answers.

• Is there a dog in the supermarket? - No, there isn't.
• Are there any dogs in the park? - Yes, there are.
• Is there a security guard in the shop? - Yes, there is.
• Are there any polar bears in Antarctica? - No, there aren't.
• Is there any ice-cream in the freezer? - Yes, there is.

 

How Many with Are There

If we want to find out the number of objects that exist we use How many in the following form:

How many + plural noun + are there (+ complement).

• How many dogs are there in the park?
• How many students are there in your class?
• How many countries are there in South America?
• How many Star Wars films are there?