SEMINAR 2 – Nouns / plurals, countability, articles
Warm-up / Using “the” with geographic names:
Complete with “the” where necessary.
the?
Bahamas (group of islands)
Baltic Sea (seas)
Elbe (rivers)
France (countries’ names including a single word)
Mont Blanc (mountains)
Lake Geneva (lakes)
Sahara (deserts)
Alps (mountain ranges)
Czech Republic (countries’ names including “Republic”, “Kingdom” etc.)
Paris, Moscow, London (cities, towns, villages)
Africa (continents)
Pacific (oceans)
Noun Countability and Plural Forms:
Study these nouns from the text. Are they countable (C) or uncountable (UN)? Do they have singular
and plural forms? If yes, what are they? First do it for the words themselves, then in the context of the text.
organism
part
bacteria
damage
ground
photosynthesis
water
soil
function
leaves
A plant is a living organism. It contains different parts; every part has a particular purpose, or a specialised
function. If one part of the plant is not functioning properly the whole plant will suffer. But we can cut flowers
off the plant or prune the roots. Such damage is only temporary and so the plant will continue to grow.
The basic parts of a plant are the root system, which is below the ground, and the shoot system, which is
above the ground. The root of a plant has two main functions. It absorbs water and minerals from the soil
through the root hairs. The root hairs are single cells near the tip of each root. The other main function of the
root is to hold the plant in position in the soil. Some plants (legumes) have special bacteria which live on their
roots. These bacteria take nitrogen out of air which is in the soil. Such leguminous plants usually help to increase
the soil fertility.
The shoot system above the ground consists of the stem, the leaves, flowers and fruit. One of the
functions of the stem is to support the plant. Another important function is that the stem carries water and
minerals from the roots to the leaves and flowers. The leaves grow out of the side of the stem; their main job
is to make food for the plant by the process of photosynthesis.
Study all nouns in the text, think about their countability / number. Are there any irregular plurals?
What is the plural form of the following nouns:
church –
tomato –
volcano –
country –
calf –
wolf –
half –
mouse –
goose –
woman –
child –
fungus –
nucleus –
species –
sheep –
fish –
deer analysis –
axis –
What is the relationship between countability and using articles? Fill in the table below.
A / AN
THE
No
article
UNCOUNTABLE
SINGULAR
COUNTABLE
PLURAL
What can be used instead of articles and modify nouns? Fill in with more examples below..
my, ……………… / some, ………………… / this, ……………… / each, ……………… / (the) other, ………………
/ much, ………………
Go through the extract from a student paper and think about the article use and other grammar
mistakes/errors:
Plastic and glass bottles for mineral water
Plastic (PET) bottles become one of the symbols of polluting environmental. Consumers throw used PET bottle
into the bin, from where it is moved into dump or burned. Glass bottle is filled and used again, so it does not
hurt environment so much.
Our mineral water companies used to pack their goods only into glass bottles and we had pretty good
deposit and refund system, so bottles could be used again. Than the situation suddenly changed with the new
shopping culture in our country.
First I should describe main shopping habits in the Czech Republic till the middle of 90’s. We used to
have many small grocery stores all around the city. Everybody went to the store and shopped for day or two. In
the middle of 90’s the situation suddenly changed. There are many new shopping centres – ”HYPERMARKETS”
and with these new stores came new ”shopping culture”. People shop for more days now, so they do not have to
go to store for so often.
Here I think is the main reason why mineral water bottlers started packing into plastic bottles. There
was a big pressure from the side of Hypermarkets. These Hypermarkets need to save place, what is the main
reason and which is not discussed so much is, that Hypermarkets do not want to care about the ”deposit and
refund glass bottle system”! It would increase their costs. They would have to employ more people and store
empty bottles.
Advantages of glass bottle:
Producers say that in the glass bottle keeps the same quality and typical taste of each kind of mineral water.
Experts know that PET bottle is ”breathing” it means that an air and a light can go through it and the mineral
water loses its minerals.
This is clear and everybody knows that the glass holds the cold or warm temperature for longer time than
plastic. Restaurants require good design of bottles, because not only quality of the products sells the product
itself. Packaging is also very important and I cannot imagine plastic bottle in the glass window of refrigerator in
better restaurant.