Transcript The Parts of Speech: Nouns - Rocklin Unified School District

The Parts of Speech: Nouns, I
• Defining
Nouns
• Types of Nouns
• Tips for Identifying Nouns
Griffin Technical College
Learning Support Center
Written by Cynthia Baynham/adapted by Scott Victor
A noun is the name of a person, place,
thing, concept (idea), or quality.
Person:
Student
Teacher
Poet
Musician
Uncle
Writer
Mother
Sculptor
Gardener
Child
Place:
College
Home
Garden
Library
Mall
Beach
City
Movie
Book
Test
Homework
Painting
Song
Park
Zoo
Thing:
Apple
Game
Bracelet
Desk
Poem
Dinner
Thumb
These are Concrete Nouns because you can experience them with at least one
of your senses.
Abstract nouns are nouns that you can’t see, touch, smell, hear or taste.
Both ideas (or concepts) and qualities are ABSTRACT nouns.
Ideas or Concepts
Qualities
Freedom
Love
Honesty
Stubbornness
Honor
Feelings
Friendliness
Happiness
Wish
Idea
Patriotism
Can you see freedom? Can you see an idea? While you can see the effects of
both freedom and love, you cannot actually experience either one with any of
your five senses. This is why they are called abstract nouns. To test to see if
they are nouns, place a possessive pronoun in front of each one.
“Our freedom,” “His love,” “Your Honesty”
Yes, they are nouns.
Common Versus Proper Nouns
Concrete nouns can be divided into two other categories:
Common vs. Proper.
Common nouns name a general person, place, or thing such as book or
friend.
Proper nouns name a specific person, place, or thing such as the
title of a book, Of Mice and Men or the name of a friend, Alison.
Notice that because proper nouns are the names of
specific people, places, or things, they are
CAPITALIZED.
Here are some more examples of common and proper
nouns:
Common
Proper
country
president
Italy
Thomas Jefferson
teacher
Ms.
Jones
game
museum
Monopoly
High Museum
song
Amazing Grace
lawyer
Johnnie Cochran
newspaper
The New York Times
uncle
Uncle Ray
doctor
Doctor Hall
Notice that because proper nouns name specific people, places, or
things, they are all CAPITALIZED.
Note that as common nouns neither president, doctor nor
uncle is capitalized.
For example, if I say:
I am going to my uncle’s house,
I am not naming a specific uncle, so “uncle” is not capitalized.
But if I say:
I am going to my Uncle Ray’s house,
I am naming a specific person, and uncle is his title, so uncle is capitalized.
The same thing happens to any other common noun that is used as a title in front of
a person’s name: Doctor Hall, Father Tim, Mister Connery, President Washington,
and Aunt Joan.
So the rule to remember is that when a common noun is used in front of a
person’s name as a title, you MUST capitalize it.
A common noun that is used as someone’s name
is also capitalized.
For example, If I say:
I am going to my mother’s house.
The word “mother” is not capitalized because I am not using it as her name. I am using
the word to express a relationship not a name.
But if I say:
I am going to Mother’s house.
The word “Mother” is capitalized because I am using it as her name. It is what I
am calling her.
We have looked at concrete and abstract nouns, as well as proper and
common nouns. Now it is time to look at another type of noun:
The Collective Noun
The collective noun is one collection of many parts.
We have one forest, but it is made of many trees.
We have one class, but it is made of many students.
We have one audience, but it is made of many people.
We have one team, but it is made of many players.
We have one troop, but it is made of many soldiers.
A collective noun names a group, a collection. While it is
made of many parts, it is ONE collection.
One last type of noun is know as the compound noun. Let’s
look at these and see how they work.
The Compound Noun
A compound noun is made up of two or more nouns
put together to make a new word. These words can be
separated, hyphenated, or simple joined together.
1.
2.
3.
4.
The seventh grade students are new to middle school.
Mr. Victor hit a bull’s-eye on his dart board.
Many people have seen the Golden Gate Bridge.
You probably want to avoid getting into a teacher’s doghouse.
So, the rule to remember is that when two nouns are
joined together, they form a new word with a new
meaning and are called compound nouns.
Forming Possessive Nouns
With the exception of a plural noun with an “s” on its end, all possessive nouns are
formed by adding an ’s.
There are two types of plural nouns, regular and irregular. A
regular noun is one which is made plural by adding an –s or
an –es. An irregular noun is made plural with either an
internal change (foot/feet) or the addition of another suffix
(child/children). Still other irregular nouns have the same
form whether they are singular or plural (fish/fish).
Chart of Possessive Nouns
Irregular Nouns
Regular Nouns
S
P
S
P
box’s
boxes’
foot’s
feet’s
hat’s
hats’
tooth’s
teeth’s
toy’s
toys’
ox’s
oxen’s
boat’s
boats’
fish’s
fish’s
child’s
children’s
Note: The apostrophe is not used if the noun is
simply plural, but shows no ownership.
1. The articles a, an, and the are noun indicators. That is, they indicate a
noun is coming, so to test if a word is a noun, place a “the” in front of the
word in question:
“the air” – Yes! “Air” is a noun.
“the empty”
No! “Empty” is not a noun.
2. Place a possessive pronoun in front of the noun( such as our, his, my)
Yes! “idea is a
“my idea” - noun.
“our follow”-
No! “follow” is not a noun.
Caution: Many English words can be more than one part of speech, so
make sure you leave the word in its sentence context when using this
test.
You are now ready to identify nouns.
Practice identifying them and
identifying their functions in the
sentence by going to this link.
Noun Practice