What Is a Number?

Two Numbers in Grammar- Singular and Plural

The number is a grammatical category. Numbers express count distinctions.

In Grammar, the number is also called grammatical number.

Noun, pronoun, adjective and verb have the number categories- Singular and Plural Number.                                                                                              

  • We call a noun singular number when it expresses a single person or thing.
  • We call a noun plural number when it expresses more than one thing or person.

Examples of Singular Number-

In our daily life, we refer nouns, pronouns, adjectives and verbs.

Sometimes we refer to those as a single.

Here are some nouns, pronouns, adjectives and verbs as the examples of the singular form.

  • Noun– boy, cat, girl, woman, notebook
  • Pronoun– I, me, you, he, him, she, her, it,
  • Adjective– my, your, his, her, its
  • Verb– am, is, was, has

Examples of Plural Number-

Sometimes we refer more than one noun, pronoun, adjective or verb to express.

Here are some examples of the plural form. 

  • Noun– boys, cats, girls, women, notebooks
  • Pronoun– we, us, you, they, them
  • Adjective– our, your, their
  • Verb– are, were, have

Singular and Plural Forms

Sometimes singular and plural forms are identical, but sometimes those are different from each other.

Let’s see how they are different from each other-

  • Sometimes both the forms are identical.

Sometimes we can make plural forms by

  • adding ‘s’ to the singular form- the most common way
  • adding ‘s’ to the words which end in ‘oo’
  • by adding ‘es’ to the words which end in ‘ch’, ‘sh’, ‘o’ or ‘x’
  • addition of ‘s’ to the words which end in ‘y’ having the vowel before it
  • adding ‘es’ to the words which end in ‘y’ having the consonant before it changing ‘y’ into ‘i’
  • the vowel sound between two consonants is changed
  • the vowel sound between two consonants is changed with its last consonant
  • ending letter ‘f’ or ‘fe’ is changed to ‘v’ with ‘es’.
  • exceptions for ‘f’ or ‘fe’
  • adding ‘en’ or ‘ren’
  • with no singular
  • with no plural
  • changing the first part, second part or both parts in compound words

We shall take those in tabular form, showing the singular form, plural form and procedure to form a plural number of a singular one.