Misplaced Modifiers

Modifiers are words, phrases or clauses that add description. Examples of modifiers:

• When COVID-19 hit I quickly picked up a new hobby: baking bread.
• I always feed my sourdough starter in the morning.
• My sourdough starter, which sits on my radiator, is very bubbly.

Misplaced modifiers occur when the modifying word or phrase is separated from the part of the sentence it modifies, creating confusion. Examples of misplaced modifiers:

• My sister ate the sourdough bread I had baked ravenously (I baked the bread ravenously?).
• I served bread to my family members on paper plates (My family members are on paper plates?!).
• Two dogs sat in the kitchen begging for bread crumbs (The kitchen is begging for bread crumbs?).

The quick fix: to avoid misplacing your modifiers, put the modifier right next to the word it describes.

• My family ravenously ate the sourdough bread I had baked (My family ate ravenously).
• I served my family members bread on paper plates (The bread is on paper plates).
• Two dogs begging for bread crumbs sat in the kitchen (Two dogs are begging for bread crumbs).

When writing this post, we referenced this blog post by our client, Grammarly.