The Adjective and the Countable/Uncountable Noun

This weekend, my niece and I played Mad Libs and she asked me to name an adjective. I paused to recall the difference between adjectives and adverbs, so as not to make a fool of myself in front of a 9 year old. I quickly remembered that adjectives are words that describe or modify a person, place or thing in the sentence. Most of us have a handle on this basic rule; however, there are a few tricky adjectives that I’d like us to look at.

First, we need to understand the difference between a countable noun and an uncountable noun. Countable nouns are ones that take on a plural form such as “dog - dogs,” “friend - friends,” “cookie - cookies,” “person - people.” Uncountable nouns usually don’t change in their plural form: “water,” “food,” “deer,” “money,” “air.” We don’t say, “I sold the deers for many moneys” because these nouns don’t change in their plural forms.

For the majority of adjectives, it doesn’t matter whether the noun is countable or uncountable. We say “the dirty dogs” and “the dirty water.” But I mention these two types of nouns, because using a countable or an uncountable noun matters with a few tricky adjectives.

Much or Many
We only use much to describe uncountable nouns:

• A pregnant lady drinks so much water.
• We don’t have much money saved.

We use many to describe only countable nouns:

• Many dogs don’t wear collars.
• The little girl ate many cookies.

A lot of or Lots of
Think of these two adjectives as casual substitutes for what we just went over with much and many. Use them with uncountable nouns when we are using them to mean much and with countable nouns when they mean many. Let’s look at some examples:

• A pregnant lady drinks lots of (much) water.
• We don’t have a lot of (much) money saved.
• Lots of (many) dogs don’t wear collars.
• The little girl ate a lot of (many) cookies.

Little or Few
Just like with much, little describes only uncountable nouns:

• There was little food leftover after Sunday’s dinner.
• It was so hot outside that it felt as though there was little air to breathe.

Likewise, the adjective few modifies only the countable nouns:

• The girl only has a few friends.
• A few people are going to the show tonight.

A little bit of
This adjective phrase is informal and always precedes an uncountable noun.

• There is a little bit of food in the dog’s bowl.
• I’m hoping for a little bit of snow before Christmas.

The tip and trick is: when using any of the adjective or adjective phrases listed above, check whether or not the noun is countable or uncountable and use the appropriate adjective. Have fun modifying!