- Students will go on an a scavenger hunt around the school or classroom looking for common nouns. A noun is a person, place, or thing. Students will write the singular noun on a t-chart organizer. After the scavenger hunt, gather students to share their findings. On the board, have two t-charts, one labeled regular plural nouns and one labeled irregular plural nouns.
- Reinforce the concept of plurals by allowing students to play interactive games on the Internet. If there is a Smartboard or interactive whiteboard in the classroom, play the games as a whole class by allowing students to take turns completing the answers. Another way to incorporate online games is to allow students to work in pairs at student computers throughout the day or during center time.
- The Literacy Zone website contains interactive forms where students can complete the plural and click a button to check their answer. These games are categorized by the rule that needs to be followed to create the plural. Examples include words ending with "o", words ending in "es", mixed plurals and words ending with "y".The Top English Teaching website contains PowerPoint games that allow students to choose the correct plural. These games contain a mixture of content. Some might focus on plural nouns or irregular plurals, while others may contain both regular and irregular plurals. These PowerPoint files can be downloaded and additional content may be added to fit the needs of your classroom.
- Play "You Got It" to practice plurals. Divide students into two teams and provide each group with an individual list of nouns so that none are repeated. Have the two teams line up facing one another in the classroom. Choose a team to begin and have one student at the front of the line name a noun to the student who is standing opposite of them in the line. That student must then provide the plural for the noun and spell it aloud. If the player is correct, his or her teammates will call out, "You got it!" If the answer is incorrect, that student must sit out for the remainder of the game. Play will continue by giving each team a turn at calling out a noun. The last student standing will be determined the winner and will be the beginning player in the next round.
- Write a word and plural pair on the board for students to see. Rotate correct and incorrect pairs, such as deer and deer for correct pairs or ox and oxes for incorrect pairs. Ask students to give you a "thumbs up" if the pair on the board are correct examples, of a word and its plural and a "thumbs down" if it is incorrect. If a "thumbs down" is given, ask a student to come to the board and write the correct pair. Students may be divided into teams for this activity and given bells to ring in the fastest with their answer.
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