Formuler des questions – Making questions
Answers are what we are looking for. Don’t forget you will get answers only if you are able to make questions!
Quelques révisions d’abord – Some revisions first…
– We first learnt how to make questions using the adjective quel, for interrogations about the noun:
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| Quelle est votre nationalité ? | What is your nationality? | |
| Quelle couleur est-ce que vous préférez ? | What colour do you prefer? |
– We learnt then how to make questions with yes/no answers, using rising tone or est-ce que structure:
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| Vous habitez à Hong Kong ? | Do you live in Hong Kong? | |
| Est-ce que vous habitez à Hong Kong ? | Do you live in Hong Kong? |
– We learnt how to make questions about what, using rising tone or est-ce que structure:
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| Vous faites quoi ? | What are you doing? | |
| Qu’est-ce que vous faites ? | What are you doing? |
It is time now to expand your possibilities of making all kind of questions.
You will be happy to know that if you understand how questions about what work, what follows should be easy to understand. Start by observing the following examples:
Où ? – Where?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| où ? | where? | |
| Tu habites où ? | Where do you live? | |
| Où est-ce que tu habites ? | Where do you live? |
Quand ? – When?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| quand ? | when? | |
| Il va quand en France ? | When does he go to France? | |
| Quand est-ce qu’il va en France ? | When does he go to France? |
Qui ? – Who?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| qui ? | who? | |
| Tu cherches qui ? | Who are you looking for? | |
| Qui est-ce que tu cherches ? | Who are you looking for? |
Comment ? – How?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| comment ? | how? | |
| Tu vas comment ? | How are you? | |
| Comment est-ce que tu vas ? | How are you? |
Pourquoi ? – Why?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| pourquoi ? | why? | |
| Pourquoi est-ce qu’ils demandent ça ? | Why are they asking that? | |
| (impossibility to make questions in why with rising tone) |
Combien de … ? – How many?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| combien de … ? | how many? | |
| Tu as combien de frères et soeurs ? | How many brothers ans sisters do you have? | |
| Combien de frères et soeurs est-ce que tu as ? | How many brothers ans sisters do you have? |
Combien ? – How much?
| 🇫🇷 French | 🇬🇧 English | |
|---|---|---|
| combien ? | how much? | |
| Ça coûte combien ? | How much does it cost? | |
| Combien est-ce que ça coûte ? | How much does it cost? |
You can choose to make your questions using rising tone or with est-ce que structure.
As you can see, the interrogative word comes at the end of a ‘rising tone’ question. The structure is:
subject + verb + interrogative word ?
For ‘est-ce que’ questions, the structure is:
interrogative word + est-ce que + subject + verb ?