Are you having trouble understanding what modifiers are? This blog post will help clear up some of that confusion.
Modifiers are words that add more meaning to a sentence.
They usually modify people, places, or things or actions stated in the sentence.
Example: The big football player charged aggressively at the quarterback.
In the sentence above, the underlined words are the modifiers, while the italicized words are the ones being modified. These underlined words are also adjectives and adverbs, respectively.
This may seem pretty simple so far, but errors in regards to modifiers do happen (and they happen pretty often).
One common error is called the misplaced modifier (not to be mistaken with a dangling modifier).
This happens when a modifier is placed in a wrong spot in a sentence (i.e. not near the word it is supposed to modify) and causes it to not modify anything.
Example of a misplaced modifier: After school, the coach gave me a key for us to enter the gym.
This sentence may seem okay, but it is not. The modifier (after school) is not currently modifying anything in the sentence.
To fix this error, all you have to do is move the modifier to a spot where it can modify something.
Fixed Example: The coach gave me a key for us to enter the gym after school.
There, doesn’t this sentence sound so much better?
And all I had to do was move the modifier to the end of the sentence so that it can clearly modify the word “enter.”
Here’s another example of how this specific error can be fixed: After school, we can enter the gym with a key that the coach gave me.
With this solution, I moved and added some words so that the modifier is near the word (enter) it is modifying.
Misplaced modifiers may seem confusing right now, but there is an easy way to prevent yourself from making these mistakes (most of the time, that is).
And that solution is reading.
Reading will help you recognize these types of errors by constantly showing you how correct (and well-written) sentences should look and sound like.
So, read, read, and read (you can learn how to so effectively here).
P.S. If you want to practice your grammar skills, check out my workbook series, Grammar Better. These workbooks are easy to use, full of clear examples and have a variety of question types to challenge you. Click here to learn more.