Nouns conjure up images of creatures, locations, or objects—dog, tornado, neighbor, Popeye, Australia. Anything that can act, be acted upon, or just plain be has a noun that names it. Nouns come in four basic types:
Common: Your average everyday nouns that represent a class of objects as opposed to a particular individual. Words such as car, cat, toe, tree, idea, and location are all common nouns.
Proper: Names of individuals and places. Proper nouns always start with a capital letter; for example, Aunt Mary, Patrick, Bora Bora, Fido, and the Hope Diamond.
Compound: When two or more words represent a single being or entity, you’re looking at a compound noun: mother-in-law, baseball, toothbrush, and tennis shoe are all compound nouns. Note that some are one word, some are hyphenated, and some are two or more words separated by spaces. Sometimes more than one spelling is correct, and the accepted spelling can change over time. For example, base-ball was once correct, but it would look weird today if you hyphenated baseball.
Collective: Collective nouns are those that represent a group, such as team, herd, crew, flock, gang, and troupe. Although it is representing a group, the noun itself can be treated as singular or plural.