what is an noun

Here are two excellent sites for grammar.

http://www.uottawa.ca/academic/arts/writcent/hypergrammar/nouns.html

http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/nouns.htm

A noun names persons, places, things, and ideas.

I've boldfaced the nouns in these sentences.

Logan is a boy in my class.

I visited Wisconsin this summer.

My brother likes cheese, mushrooms, olives, pepperoni and sausage on his pizza.

The United States is a democracy.

A noun is a word that refers to a person, place, thing, idea, or quality. It is one of the eight parts of speech in English grammar. Nouns can be either singular or plural and can be used as the subject or object in a sentence.

To identify a noun in a sentence, you can follow these steps:

1. Look for words that name a person, such as "man," "woman," or "teacher."
2. Look for words that name a place, such as "city," "park," or "school."
3. Look for words that name a thing, such as "car," "book," or "computer."
4. Look for words that name an idea, such as "love," "happiness," or "freedom."
5. Look for words that name a quality, such as "beauty," "intelligence," or "kindness."

Once you have identified one or more nouns in a sentence, you can determine how they function in the sentence (e.g., subject, object, possessive) and how they relate to other words in the sentence.