Tricky Nouns Exercises

Some English nouns are misleading because their form does not match their number. Nouns ending in -s that are singular include news ("The news is shocking"), mathematics ("Mathematics is my favourite subject"), and physics, economics, politics (when referring to the academic subject). These look plural but always take a singular verb. On the other hand, nouns that are always plural include items with two parts: scissors, trousers, glasses, jeans, shorts — "The scissors are on the desk."

Other tricky nouns include people (always plural: "People are waiting"), police (always plural: "The police are coming"), and money (always singular: "The money is in the safe"). Some nouns change meaning with number: "The statistics show a trend" (plural — data points) versus "Statistics is a challenging subject" (singular — the academic field). Recognising these irregular patterns is essential for B2-level accuracy, and Cambridge First examiners specifically test these words in open cloze and sentence transformation tasks.