5 exercises — practise correct plurals for criterion, datum, index, matrix, and schema in technical English.
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses the plural of "criterion" in a technical requirements document?
"The proposal must satisfy all three criteria before it moves to review" is correct: "criteria" is the standard plural of the Greek-derived singular "criterion". Option B invents a regular "-s" plural that isn't standard usage. Option C incorrectly adds an apostrophe-s. Option D uses the singular form where a plural is required.
2 / 5
Choose the sentence that correctly treats "data" with the agreement most database and engineering teams actually use in practice.
"The data is stored in a columnar format for faster analytical queries" is correct: although "data" is technically the plural of "datum", modern technical and scientific English overwhelmingly treats "data" as a mass noun with singular agreement. Option B uses formally "correct" plural agreement that reads as stilted in most technical writing today. Option C wrongly pluralizes "data" again as "datas", which is not a word. Option D uses the bare form "be" instead of a conjugated verb.
3 / 5
Which sentence correctly distinguishes "indices" from "indexes" in a database performance discussion?
"We added three indexes to the table... consults these indices..." is correct and reflects common practice: "indexes" is the everyday plural for database index structures, while "indices" (the classical Latin plural) appears more often in mathematical or formal contexts referring to the same concept — both are accepted, but neither should be mixed with an ungrammatical singular. Option B uses the unattested singular-looking "indice" and drops the final "-es" from "indexes". Option C adds an incorrect apostrophe-s to a plural. Option D leaves both nouns in the singular where plurals are required.
4 / 5
Select the sentence that correctly pluralizes "matrix" in a linear-algebra-adjacent machine learning explanation.
"The model multiplies two weight matrices during each forward pass" is correct: "matrices" is the standard plural of "matrix" in mathematical and technical English. Option B uses the non-standard regular plural "matrixes". Option C incorrectly adds an apostrophe-s. Option D leaves "matrix" singular where a plural is needed.
5 / 5
Which sentence correctly uses "schemas" (the accepted modern plural) rather than the rare classical form when describing a multi-tenant database design?
"Each tenant... gets its own set of database schemas" is correct: in software and database contexts, "schemas" is the standard, widely accepted plural, even though the classical Greek plural "schemata" also exists in linguistics and older academic usage. Option B combines the rare classical plural with an incorrect apostrophe-s. Option C leaves "schema" singular where a plural is required. Option D adds an incorrect apostrophe-s to the regular plural.