The plural and possessive forms of English words often confuse people who are just beginning to write. Many writers incorrectly use apostrophes to indicate both plurals and possessives, while many writers whose first language is not English completely omit the apostrophe because their mother tongue does not use it. Others are still not sure when to use "-s" and when to use "-es" to indicate the plural of a word.
Steps
Method 1 of 3: Decide when to use the plural and when to use the possessive
Step 1. Use the plural to indicate more than 1 item
For example: “I installed 1 door of the 2 doors I bought”. The plural “doors” indicates that more than 1 door was purchased.
Step 2. Use the possessive to indicate ownership of something
For example: "The boy's dog chased the girls down the street." The possessive "boy's" indicates that the boy is the owner of the dog that chased the girls. Add an apostrophe and an "s" to make a word possessive.
Step 3. Know that there are exceptions to the rules
Most words will follow the basic rules for making a word plural or possessive. However, there are some words that don't follow the rules. It takes time and practice to identify if a word is an exception. In these situations, it helps to have a quality dictionary.
Method 2 of 3: Make a word plural
Step 1. Put an “-s” after most nouns to make the word plural
"Cat" means that there is only one cat. "Cats" means that there is more than one cat. This rule applies to most words in English.
- An "-s" without an apostrophe is also used to show the plural of acronyms in uppercase (such as "POWs" for "prisoners of war" or "RBIs" for "runs batted in") or for decade labels, such as "The 1880s" or "1950s". When the decade label is abbreviated, such as “'50s” to say “1950s,” an apostrophe is used before the number 50 to show that a part was cut off.
- An apostrophe followed by "-s" can be used to indicate the plural of individual lowercase letters, abbreviations with periods, or other abbreviations where the "s" alone would be confusing, such as "x's." Generally, apostrophes are only used for lowercase letters. Capital letters and numbers, as in "MP3s", do not need an apostrophe. In general, the apostrophe is not used to indicate the plural.
- The abbreviations of units of measurement do not have a plural, while the abbreviations that are used to indicate the parts of the writing may not indicate the plural ("ch" for "chapter" or "chapters") or a single letter is used for the singular. and a double letter for the plural ("p" for "page", but "pp" for "pages").
Step 2. Pay attention to compound nouns
For certain compound words, it is necessary to identify which word is the one that is pluralized. For compound words such as “daughter-in-law” or “attorney general”, the first word is pluralized (“daughters-in-law” or “attorneys general”).
Step 3. Place an “-es” after the words that end with “-ch”, “-sh”, “-x”, “-z”, “-s” or the sounds that these letter combinations mimic
For example: the plural of "ditch" is "ditches", the plural of "brush" is "brushes", the plural of "fox" is "foxes", the plural of "fuzz" is "fuzzes" and the plural of "Dress" is "dresses".
- If the word ends in “-e”, the plural is formed by adding an “s”: the plural of “judge” is “judges” and the plural of “phrase” is “phrases”.
- To form the plural of some words that end in "-s", the final "s" is doubled before adding the plural suffix. The plural form of "bus" can be written as "buses" or "busses", depending on whether the word "bus" refers to a vehicle ("buses") or to an electronic component ("busses").
Step 4. Place “-es” after words ending in “-o” preceded by a consonant
The plural of "tomato" is "tomatoes" and the plural of "zero" is "zeroes."
- Words ending in “-o” followed by a single consonant, which English receives from another language, usually form the plural by adding “-s”. The plural of "piano" is "pianos."
- Some words that end in "-o" preceded by a consonant can form the plural with either "-es" or with "-s". The plural of "tornado" can be written "tornadoes" or "tornadoes" and the plural of "volcano" can be written "volcanoes" or "volcanos."
Step 5. Place “-es” after words ending in “-y” preceded by a consonant
However, first you have to change the "-y" to an "-i". For example: the plural of "berry" is "berries" and the plural of "lady" is "ladies."
- This rule generally does not apply to proper nouns ending in "-y": the plural of "Tony" (man's name or theater award) is "Tonys".
- Some words that end in "-y" preceded by a vowel also change the "y" to an "-i": the plural of "money" can be written as "monies".
Step 6. Place “-es” after some words that end with an “f” sound
You have to change the "f" to a "-v". The plural of "calf" is "calves," the plural of "knife" is "knives," and the plural of "leaf" is "leaves," except when referring to the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team. However, the plural of “proof” is “proofs” not “proves”, which is a form of the verb “to prove”.
- Some words that end in "f" can form the plural, either by adding an "-s" or changing the "f" to a "v" and adding "-es", as in "hoof" ("hoofs" or " hooves”) or“staff”(“staffs”or“staves”). For some words, the preferred form depends on the usage; the plural of "dwarf" is "dwarfs" when referring to real people of short stature and "dwarves" when referring to a race from fantasy literature.
- Consulting a dictionary is useful if you are not sure whether you should convert the “f” to “-v”.
Step 7. Take into account the mutated plurals
Mutated plurals have irregular shapes. For example: "children" is the plural of "child" and "women" is the plural of "woman".
- Latin and Greek words are another form of mutated plurals. These nouns retain their Latin and Greek form when plural. For example: "criterion" or "phenomenon" form the plural by eliminating the "-on" and adding a "-a" ("criteria", "phenomena").
- Other unusual plurals include "mice" (plural of "mouse"), "geese" (plural of "goose"), and "feet" (plural of "foot"). "Sheep" and "moose" are the same in singular or plural in English.
Step 8. Take into account the collective nouns
Collective nouns are singular when they refer to a group and plural when they refer to an individual. Some common collective nouns are "group", "staff", "team", "family", "audience", "committee". Staff is singular in this sentence because the group acts as a unit: "The staff is very satisfied." Staff is plural in this sentence because it refers to what people do: “The staff are working in different locations this week”.
- The names of sports companies, organizations and teams are considered unique. The name of the sports team "Tennessee Titans" is unique even though there is an "s" at the end.
- The conventions of American and British English differ on using plural verbs with collective nouns. Generally, American English uses singular verbs with collective nouns, such as "The crowd is going wild for this team." In British English, a singular or plural verb can be used with collective nouns, such as "The crowd are going wild for this team."
Method 3 of 3: Make a Word Show Possession
Step 1. Form the possessive of a common or proper singular noun, adding an apostrophe followed by an “s”
This rule can be applied to all singular nouns, regardless of whether they end in "s" or not. For example: "Agnes's book", "Mary's book" and "the dog's toy" all follow this rule.
Step 2. Form the possessive of a plural noun by adding an apostrophe to it
If the word ends with an "s", add an apostrophe after the "s". If the word doesn't end with an "s," add an apostrophe followed by an "s." If you want to make a noun with an irregular plural possessive, you have to add an apostrophe followed by an "s".
The possessive form of “lions” would be “lions '”, while the possessive form of “children” would be “children's”, as in the sentence “The children's toys fell into the lions' den at the zoo”
Step 3. Form the possessive of a personal pronoun without using an apostrophe
The correct forms of the third person singular "he", "she" or "it" are "his", "hers" and "its", without apostrophes. The correct first person "I" form is "my" if the object you own is mentioned and "mine" if it is not mentioned. Similarly, the possessive forms of the first person plural "we" are "our" and "ours", respectively; for "you", they are "your" and "yours", respectively; and for "they", they are "their" and "theirs", respectively.
Step 4. Carefully form the possessive of compound nouns
The placement of an apostrophe differs when the nouns act together or separately. In this sentence, compound nouns act separately: "Jane’s and John’s bikes are in the garage." Jane and John have their own bike in the garage. In this sentence, the compound nouns act collectively: "John and Jane’s bike is in the garage." This phrase indicates that John and Jane share ownership of a bicycle.
- Just think about whether the subjects share ownership of what they own, which means that they will also share the apostrophe. If they own separate things, they each need their own apostrophe.
- Although the first word of a compound noun can be pluralized, such as “daughter-in-law” or “attorney general”, the possessive is always attached to the last word of the compound, such as “daughter-in-law's” or “attorney general's.”.
- In the case of the possessive plural, it would be acceptable to write “daughters-in-law's” or “attorneys general's”, but it would be less confusing to show possession with a prepositional phrase, such as “of my daughters-in-law” or “of the attorneys general".
Advice
- Always consult a dictionary if the plural of a word confuses you.
- You should check your work to make sure you are using the correct forms of the words. If you tend to write the plural when you should write the possessive, look up the words that end in “-s” or “-es” to see if they need an apostrophe. On the other hand, if you tend to use possessives when you should write the plural, look at each apostrophe to see if its use is justified.