Grammar » A2 Grammar lessons and exercises » Asking questions in English – Question forms
Exercises Explanation Downloads
  • Asking questions in English – Question forms

    Exercise 1

    Choose the correct forms to complete the questions below.

    1 How often to the dentist?

    2 How many brothers and sisters ?

    3 What time pick me up?

    4 Where last night?

    5 John this morning?

    6 Why that box there?

    7 What with the scissors?

    8 When a decision?

    9 What time you tomorrow?

    10 Who to the party?


     

  • Word order in questions – Grammar chart

    Word order in questions

    Download full-size image from Pinterest

    Questions in general

    If we want to ask a question in English, the order is QWASM: Question word, Auxiliary verb, Subject, Main verb. In Yes-No questions (questions where the answer is yes or no), there is no Question Word.

    Questions with be as the main verb

    When be is the main verb, it is used as the Auxiliary in the question, and then we don’t have a Main verb after the Subject.

    Auxiliary verbs

    In the position of Auxiliary, we can use be, do, have or any modal verb: can, could, will, would, should, etc.

    Have is only an auxiliary verb in the form have got and in the present perfect.

    • Have you got any brothers or sisters?
    • What have you cooked for lunch?

    For other uses of have, we need an auxiliary verb (do, did) for questions.

    • What time did you have dinner yesterday? (NOT had you dinner)
    • Do you have to do it now? (NOT Have you to do it)

    Have got only has a present form. It does not have a past form.

    • Did you have many toys when you were a child? (NOT Had you got many toys when you were a child?)

     

    Question words

    Question words - Wh- words

    Download full-size image from Pinterest

    how much

    We can use how much to ask about the price of something.

    • How much is the jacket?

    how + adjective

    We can use how + adjective (any adjective) as a question word.

    • How tall are you?
    • How fast is your car?

    which vs what

    We can use which + noun, and we can also use what + noun. We use which when there are a small number of possible answers. Look at the difference:

    • Which car do you like, the red or the blue? (there is a small number of possible answers)
    • What car have you got?’ ‘A Mercedes.’ (many possible answers)
  • We are working on this!

    We're developing a NEW LEARNING PLATFORM with a subscription plan that includes additional features at an affordable price. One of those features will be PDF downloads.

    Learn more!

  • Personalized English Lessons

    Test-English is delighted to announce our partnership with Gymglish to deliver short, personalized and fun online English lessons.

    Learn more!