🅶 Formuler des questions – Making questions

Quelques révisions d’abord – Some revisions first…

1️⃣ 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?

2️⃣ 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?

3️⃣ 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. [icon name=”face-smile-beam” prefix=”fas”]

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 ?