The MBA Center Grammar Review for the TOEFL - part 5 pot

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Sentences without articles

Sometimes, a noun does not need an article. If we are referring to a general idea, usually

a noncount noun, no article is needed.

School is difficult in the summer. (general, all schools)

A school should be clean. (general, yet one example of a general subject)

The school is far from here. (a specific school)

Cats are either hated or loved. (general)

The cats of Africa include lions and cheetahs. (specific)

Do you like chocolate? (general)

Do you have the chocolate I like? (specific)

Nouns as modifiers

If a noun is used to modify or describe another noun, it must always be singular. Careful,

there are exceptions to this rule that are tested. And be very careful of trying to find a rule

that is always true; this point will depend on the placement of the noun. Let’s take a

hyphenated noun as our example.

This is a three-year-old child.

or

The child is three years old.

The 1000-dollar contract was invalid.

or

The contract was worth only 1000 dollars.

This is a two-bedroom house.

or

The house has two bedrooms.

In the first sentence of each example, the noun phrase (three-year-old, 1000-dollar, and

two-bedroom) is modifying the actual noun. But in the second sentence the same noun

phrases are objects in the sentence.

Always look for the grammatical reason for the word. Is it a modifier? singular. Is it a noun?

could be plural. Let’s look at some exceptions.

Almost all nouns ending in “-ics” are plural but take a singular verb.

Mathematics is a hard subject.

My physics teacher is very good.

There is nothing better for you than gymnastics.

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