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ACT English: Punctuation Drill 2, Problem 3. Where does the semicolon fit best?
ACT English: Punctuation Drill 3, Problem 4. Which choice best formats this list of items?
ACT English Punctuation Drill 3, Problem 3. Where should we place the apostrophe to properly indicate possession?
ACT English 3.1 Passage Drill 194 Views
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Description:
ACT English: Passage Drill Drill 3, Problem 1. Where does "however" best fit into this sentence?
Transcript
- 00:04
Here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by
- 00:06
strong winds. Not the kind brought on by beans.
- 00:18
How would you correct this underlined segment from the passage, if at all?
- 00:22
Strong winds are powerful enough to lift animals, people, trees, and houses, however, such as
- 00:27
those in a tornado or hurricane.
Full Transcript
- 00:38
This question requires us to know a dangling modifier when we see one. Lucky for us, they're easy to spot.
- 00:43
Whenever we find a modifying word or phrase that's a long way from the thing it's
- 00:47
trying to describe, we know we have a dangling modifier on our hands.
- 00:50
The underlined portion has a good example of this grammatical no-no.
- 00:54
The phrase "such as those in a tornado or hurricane" is trying to describe "strong
- 00:59
winds." But it's having a tough time doing so because there's a lot of sentence in between.
- 01:03
Remember: to avoid confusion, it's best to place the modifier directly before or after
- 01:08
the thing it's describing. Since our underlined portion fails to do this, we can eliminate choice (A).
- 01:14
Choices (C) and (D) both avoid this mistake. In each option, "strong winds" is immediately
- 01:19
followed by "such as those in a tornado or hurricane."
- 01:22
The trouble is that both choices misplace the word "however," which should be at
- 01:26
the beginning of the sentence because it addresses a contrast with the previous sentence. Thus,
- 01:30
we can cross out both (C) and (D).
- 01:32
Choice (B) is the best answer because it correctly places "however" at the beginning of the
- 01:36
sentence and is blissfully free of dangling modifiers.
- 01:39
A tornado, followed by a bunch of frogs bashing into people's heads seems like a cruel one-two
- 01:43
punch from Mother Nature.
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