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English
Modifiers can be words- like happy, pretty, silly, crazy, hopeful, fast, slow, very, much, many. Modifiers can also be phrases. You can identify a modifier by its function in the sentence- is it providing information, adding detail or describing something else? If so, it is probably a modifier.

Once you have identified a modifier, you need to identify the person, place or thing that it is modifying. Modifiers usually have to accompany the thing they are modifying or go as close to it as possible.

Adjectives typically go before the words they are modifying, or after with helping verbs. For example:

* The pretty girl

* The girl was pretty.

In the first example, pretty is an adjective modifying the noun girl. In the second example, was is a helping verb and pretty is again an adjective modifying girl.

Adverbs can go before or after the thing they are modifying, depending on what exactly is it they are modifying. For example:

* The very pretty girl
* He ran quickly

In the first example, the adverb very is modifying the adjective pretty which is modifying the noun girl. In the second example, the adverb quickly is modifying the verb ran.

Modifiers are words, phrases, or clauses that provide description in sentences. Modifiers allow writers to take the picture that they have in their heads and transfer it accurately to the heads of their readers. Essentially, modifiers breathe life into sentences. Take a look at this "dead" sentence:

Stephen dropped his fork.

Now read what several well placed modifiers can do:

_________ Stephen, who just wanted a quick meal to get through his three-hour biology lab, quickly dropped his fork on the cafeteria tray, gagging with disgust as a tarantula wiggled out of his cheese omelet, a sight requiring a year of therapy before Stephen could eat eggs again.

Modifiers can be adjectives, adjective clauses, adverbs, adverb clauses, absolute phrases, infinitive phrases, participle phrases, and prepositional phrases. The sentence above contains at least one example of each:

Adjective = __________.

Adjective clause = who just wanted a quick meal.

Adverb = quickly.

Adverb clause = as a tarantula wiggled out of his cheese omelet.

Absolute phrase = a sight requiring a year of therapy before Stephen could eat eggs again.

Infinitive phrase = to get through his three-hour biology lab.

Participle phrase = gagging with disgust.

Prepositional phrase = on the cafeteria tray.

Without modifiers, sentences would be no fun to read. Carefully chosen, well-placed modifiers allow you to depict situations with as much accuracy as words will allow.