Transcript of SOS Grammar Lesson 14 – Direct Question Structures

SOS Grammar Lesson 14: The Structure of Direct Questions. In today’s lesson, we are going to discuss the structure of three different types of direct questions. Open and closed questions and alternative questions.

You might have learnt the structure of questions before, but I often notice as a teacher that the structures of questions are sometimes confused, or the order of auxiliary verb and subject is wrong, or the subject-verb agreement is wrong. So in this lesson, we are going to go over the structures of some real examples, and I’m going to help you nail down this structure so you remember every single time you ask a question.

Thankfully, English, for the most part, has a very primary consistent and easy to follow structure when it comes to questions. There are four main parts that you need to keep in mind when it comes to a question. So let’s start by looking at the structure of open questions to demonstrate that.

Open questions are open because they require the person to provide more detail and a more extended response. So the structure is the first part, the question word or the question phrase. So a question word would be ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘where’, ‘why’, ‘when’ and ‘how’? Or a question phrase would be ‘how much’, ‘how often’, ‘how long’, ‘how many’, ‘how many times’, ‘what time’, ‘what day’, etc..

The second part is the auxiliary verb. So we have, for example, ‘be’, which would be ‘are’, ‘is’, ‘were’, ‘was’, ‘do’, or ‘have’. And it can also be a modal auxiliary verb like ‘can’, ‘could’, ‘will’, or ‘should’.

Thirdly, you need your subject ‘I’, ‘you’, ‘him’, ‘her’, ‘it’, ‘we’, and ‘they’. Now, the way that we conjugate ‘it’ is the same for ‘him’ or ‘her’.

And lastly, your main verb or your helper verb. So this can be any verb like ‘run’ or ‘walk’ or ‘think’ or ‘find’ or ‘start’. Any verb.

Now, these are the four things that you need, and you need them in that order every time you begin a question with a question word or phrase. Now, sometimes the order of the question word can change. But we’ll talk about that in a moment.

Firstly, subject-verb agreement. The auxiliary verb needs to match the subject. So we need to have the right subject-verb agreement. For example, ‘Where was he on Saturday?’ Or ‘Where were they on Saturday?’ So in that example, the correct auxiliary verb is used for the right subject.

Let’s have a look at some examples of open questions. ‘Where do you live?’ ‘Where did you live?’ So we have one example in the Simple Present and one in the Past. ‘How does it work?’ ‘How did it work?’ ‘How long have you been working here?’ That’s an example of a Present Perfect question using a question phrase. ‘What do you need?’.

So listen for this example. So ‘what’, question word, ‘do’, auxiliary, ‘you’, subject, ‘need’ helper verb. Now let’s look at how these questions, how this question structure changes through different tenses.

While I’m saying these different questions, in your head, try and identify the question word, the auxiliary verb, the subject, and the helper verb.

Simple Present. ‘What do you do?’ Simple Past. ‘What did you do?’ Present Continuous. ‘What are you doing?’ Past Continuous. ‘What were you doing?’ Present Perfect. ‘What have you done this week?’ Past Perfect Continuous. ‘What have you been doing?’ Present Future. ‘What will you do?’ Present Continuous. ‘What are you doing tomorrow?’.

How did you go? Did you identify the question word, the auxiliary, and the subject?

Now let’s talk about what happens when there are no auxiliary verbs. ‘When’, ‘What’, ‘Who’, and ‘Which’, or ‘Whose’ is the subject, or part of the subject. We do not use the auxiliary. We use the word order “subject + verb”.

So I’m going to demonstrate that with these examples. ‘What fell off the wall?’ So ‘what’ becomes the subject. ‘What fell’, ‘what’ = subject, ‘fell’ = verb.

‘Which horse won?’ ‘Which horse won the Melbourne Cup?’ ‘Who bought this?’ ‘Whose phone rang?’ are all examples of questions where there are no auxiliary verbs.

What about negative question words? When we ask negative questions, we use the auxiliary verb ‘do’ when there is no other auxiliary or modal verb, even when the question word is the subject of the clause. For example, ‘Who wants an ice cream?’ is the positive example. ‘Who doesn’t want an ice cream?’.

Or ‘Which door opened?’ is the positive example. ‘Which door didn’t open?’ is the negative example.

Something that also happens in, particularly in spoken English, is we put a question word at the end of a statement to make a question. So you may hear some of these examples. ‘What’s today’s date?’ is a general question word. But if we put it at the end, ‘Today’s date is what?’ And we tend to put that rising inflection at the end.

We do this, especially when we want to check information that we’ve already been given, or when we want to quickly check a particular detail. Maybe we think something is the contrary of what we’re trying to ask. And these are less formal than full question words. For example, here are two more examples. ‘You’re travelling with who?’ And ‘She’s been here until when?’ And then we tend to put that really strong rising inflection at the end, particularly in Australia.

Now let’s move on to talk about closed questions. Questions that start with an auxiliary are closed questions because they just require a simple answer, usually just yes or no. For example, ‘Did you like the meal?’ Auxiliary + Subject + Verb. ‘Did’ = auxiliary, ‘you’ = subject, ‘like’ = verb. And then sometimes at the end we put the noun. So ‘the meal’.

We can also use modal verbs in the place of an auxiliary verb, and the structure would be the same: Modal Verb + Subject + the Main Verb. For example, ‘Could you see the stage?’.

What about negative closed questions? Now, these are interesting because negative questions can create the potential for misunderstanding.

I usually say to try and avoid using them. Now, here are some common negative questions and positive versions of those same questions.

Now, with negative closed questions, you can have two structures. You’re going to have the “Auxiliary Verb + Not”, and they would be contracted. So an example of that would be ‘aren’t’. So it’s ‘are not’ = ‘aren’t’ and then the Subject and then The Verb.

Or alternatively, if you use the auxiliary verb, the full auxiliary verb, and don’t contract it, you need to have “Auxiliary Verb + Subject + Not + Verb”. So let me demonstrate that with an example. ‘Aren’t you going to school tomorrow?’, ‘Are you not going to school tomorrow?’ are both examples of negative versions.

And then a positive version, ‘Are you going to school tomorrow?’ And another example. ‘Didn’t you find it?’ ‘Did you not find it?’ Negative examples. ‘Did you find it?’ Positive example. ‘Won’t you go on holidays next week?’ ‘Will you not go on holidays next week?’ Negative examples and then positive example, ‘Will you go on holidays next week?’.

Now the subject-verb agreement, again, is really important. The auxiliary verb needs to match the subject, so we need to have the right subject + verb to make sure they’re in agreement.

So listen to these examples. ‘Do you live in Melbourne?’ ‘Do’ = auxiliary, ‘you’ = subject, ‘live’ = verb, in Melbourne? ‘Does he live in Melbourne?’ ‘Do they live in Melbourne?’ ‘Is he okay?’ Is it okay?’ ‘Are they okay?’ ‘Do you have any questions?’ ‘Does anyone have any questions?’ ‘Does it work?’ So notice how the auxiliary changes depending on the subject.

Now, when you’re listening to native speakers, we tend to make grammar mistakes. And I want to clear up a grammar question I get a lot to do with ‘closed questions’. So native speakers love to do their own thing when it comes to the grammar for questions that begin with an auxiliary verb.

So listen to these examples. This example is in the correct structure. ‘Does that make sense?’ ‘Does’ = auxiliary, ‘that’ = subject, ‘make sense?’ = the verb.

What we tend to do. Native speakers will tend to say ‘Make sense?’ with a rising inflection at the end. So we drop the auxiliary verb.

Another example. ‘Do you want to come with me?’ We’ll tend to say ‘Want to come with me?’ So we drop that first auxiliary verb. ‘Are you okay?’ ‘You okay?’ ‘Do you have any suggestions?’ ‘Any suggestions?’ ‘Do you have any questions?’ ‘Any questions?’.

So if you hear a native speaker using the incorrect structure, well, it’s become so widely accepted that we use that, and we have the rising inflection at the end.

Now, finally, we have alternative questions. An alternative question is a question that presents two or more possible answers and presupposes that only one is true. And the structure would be “Auxiliary Verb + Subject + Verb + Option 1 or Option 2”.

‘Do you want the red one or the blue one?’ ‘Would you like the chocolate or vanilla?’ ‘Are you going on Monday or Tuesday?’.

And finally, how can you practice the grammar of questions? English has a lot of patterns when it comes to questions, especially when you want to compare a particular question to the different ways you ask it in different tenses.

I suggest creating a question bank for different situations rather than just trying to learn a big random list of questions. That’s why in the Academy we have a speaking practice call, which is a Member Run Session where I try to get students to practice the art of asking questions.

I think as an English learner or a language learner, it’s something we don’t encourage people to do enough: asking questions. My suggestion for you is to think about the different situations and come up with a list of maybe five questions you might ask in a different situation. And then try to think of that structure, and practice that structure.

For example, the situation might be ‘waiting for the train’. What are five questions you might ask somebody at the train station? And try to match the question word, the auxiliary, and the subject. For example. ‘Where can I find the ticket machine?’ ‘Where’ = question word, ‘can’ = auxiliary verb, ‘I’ = subject, ‘find’ = verb. And then, of course, the noun = the ticket machine. ‘What time will the train leave?’ ‘How long is the train delayed?’ ‘What time is the next train?’