Learn English Nouns and Pronouns
Verbs are certainly important, but you can only say a little with nouns!
In any sample of English--spoken or written--one of
the 10 most common words is the. What
does that suggest? Yes! Lots of nouns--because the just about always
occurs with a noun.
Additionally, noun phrase structure is complex and
often a puzzle for our students. We know that learning to use a/an and the with
the right noun types for the right meanings is difficult for many
students. And, the is one of the most
common words, so the challenge meets students at every turn.
A noun is a word for a person, place, thing, or idea
and is usually reasonably specific. Some examples of nouns are girl, lion, chair,
and belief. Notice that each of these words represents a living or inanimate
object, and you can picture each in your head. A pronoun could
be used to replace one of these nouns if you did not want to use the specific
noun. For instance, she is a pronoun that could be used to replace girl, and it
is a pronoun that could be used to take the place of a chair. When a pronoun is
used in place of a noun, it must match the number, point of view, and gender of
the noun it is replacing.