Irregular plural nouns

2. Irregular Plural Nouns inIrregular Plural Nouns in
EnglishEnglish

3. • Irregular plural nouns are nouns that do
not become plural by adding -s or -es, as
most nouns in the English language do.
• There are hundreds of irregular plural
nouns, and in truth, you must memorize
them through reading and speaking.
There are, however, some common
patterns to look out for.

4. The Most Common Irregular
Plurals
• Nouns ending in -f and -fe
• To make a plural of a word ending in -f,
change the f to a v and add es. Similarly, if
a word ends in -fe, change the f to a v and
add an s.

5. Exceptions: roofs and proofs (among others).

6. Singular Plural (vowel change)
foot feet
tooth teeth
goose geese
man men
woman women
Nouns That Change Vowels

7. Irregular Nouns That Change
Substantially
Singular Plural
louse lice
mouse mice
die dice
ox oxen
child children
person people*
penny pence (in British usage)

8. Irregular Nouns That Do Not
Change At All
Singular/ Plural (no change)
sheep
fish
deer
moose
buffalo
shrimp
trout