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Teachers & SchoolsStudents
Teachers & SchoolsThis video explains what dangling modifiers are and, more importantly, how to avoid them. It provides a useful formula for using a modifying phrase to ensure strong sentence construction.
Conventions | Demonstrate command of grammar conventions |
English | Grammar & Punctuation |
Grammar & Punctuation | Grammar |
Language | English Language |
Oral and Written Conventions | Sentence Structure |
my car windshield Or a deer hit just my car
windshield Well welcome to the wonderful world of modifiers If
you couldn't guess a modifier is a word or phrase
that modify another word or phrase Yeah sometimes if you're
not careful you can misplace a modifier A misplaced modifier
is a modifier that modifies the wrong thing A modifier
khun b a single word like only just or almost
let's Look at a couple of examples you could say
mike ate only venison or mike only ate venison In
these examples the word on ly modifies the word behind
it giving these senses completely different meanings if you say
like a lonely venison what you mean is that mike
ate nothing but dead dear If you say mike on
ly ate venison However what you mean is that the
only thing mike did with the deer meat was eating
He didn't cook it and he didn't buy it from
his local grocer You could also use a short phrase
at the beginning of a sentence as a modifier Here's
the formula short modifying phrase plus comma Plus the rest
of the sentence gets you there Just remember whatever the
modifying phrase were first who should immediately follow the comma
Here are some examples While you could say freshly cooked
lisa left the venison said cool down what you really
mean is freshly cooked the venison was left bite elisa
to cool them well you might be tempted to say
covered in flies the highway crew pulled the deer carcass
off the road What you really mean is covered in
flies The deer carcass was pulled off the road by
the highway crew When it comes to modifiers the smartest
thing you could do is pay attention to what you're
writing You don't want to misplace a modifier any more
than you want to misplace any leftover bam really bambi 00:02:26.47 --> [endTime] is that nice