Who questions examples. How to ask a question to a subject in English. Examples. Questions to the subject - how to answer

We continue to tell you how to ask questions correctly in English language. Today we will get acquainted with special questions and questions to the subject. Go!

So that's why we decided to separate these types of questions into one article. The fact is that both types of questions begin with the question words Wh-. The only difference is in the very construction of the question and the purpose for which it should be asked.

So, asking a question to the subject helps us clarify information about someone. And special questions help to find out more information in a certain situation - about the place, time, quality of the item, etc.

Special question

A special question begins with a question word (or group of words) followed by an auxiliary or modal verb, subject and semantic verb (the structure of the general question is preserved). The special question follows the same pattern as general question: first auxiliary or a modal verb is placed before the subject, in Present And Past Indefinite(where there is no auxiliary verb) an auxiliary verb is used to do (do, does, did), and the semantic verb is placed in the infinitive without to (dictionary form). Verbs to be And to have(as a semantic verb) do not require an auxiliary verb to do, (they themselves are placed before the subject).

Special question outline:

In addition to the question words presented in the diagram, there are others. There are quite a lot of them, we advise you to remember them.

Question to the subject

In essence, a question to the subject is the same special question, but it needs to be asked a little differently.

In English, we ask a question to the subject using the words: who - who (for living beings: people, animals, birds, etc.) what - what (for inanimate objects: plants, things, nature, etc.) We put these words first in the sentence, replacing the character with them. When we ask a question to the subject, there is no need to remember the auxiliary verb and put it in first place.

Scheme of a question to the subject:

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In order to ask a question to the subject in English, you first need to understand 3 things: what the subject is (the main member of the sentence, answers the question who? what?), what and.

Special question to the subject in English. Structure.

1. My colleague is writing a report in the office.

2. 10 students came to school.

3. Porridge is burning in the kitchen.

Negative form of questions to the subject in English

The negative form of questions to the subject in English is based on the principle negative sentences, that is, the auxiliary verbs do, does, did are used. The particle NOT is placed after a modal or auxiliary verb.

4. This student hasn’t answered my question yet.

5. Kate doesn’t speak English.

How to formulate a question to a subject in English?

1. Find the subject in the sentence.
2. Replace it with a suitable one interrogative pronoun
   -Who? (who?) or What? (What?).
3. Maintain direct word order, while leaving all members of the sentence in their place.
4. Writing a question to a subject in English
   remember to agree the verb with the subject - in Present Simple use the verb in
   third person singular - add the ending -s (es) to
   verb (e.g. Who wants tea?).

5. IMPORTANT! Question to determining the subject
   has the same structure as a question to the subject,
   they use special words such as what?
   (which?), which (which?), whose (whose?), how many/much
   (How many?).

Questions to determine the subject in English:

1. What film is the best? Which movie is the best?
2. How many students attend lectures? How many students
   attends lectures?

Examples of questions to the subject in English

Example 1.

John is going to England next week.

1. Subject - John

2. Replace John with who

3.We maintain direct word order (that is,
subject + predicate)

Question to the subject: Who is going to England
next week? Who's going to England next
week?

Example 2.

Viktuk's play was staged.

Questions to the subject:

Whose play was staged?
Whose play was staged?

What was staged? What did they put on stage?

Example 3.

The girls are happy.

Question to the subject: Who is happy? Who
happy?

Example 4.

We were in the circus.

Question to the subject: Who was in the circus?
Who was at the circus?

Example 5.

We were in the circus.

Question to the subject: Who was in the circus?
Who was at the circus?

Exercises (question to the subject in English
language)

1. 5 (O)
2. 6 (O)
3. 7 (S)
4. 8 (S)
5. 9 (O)
6. 10 (S)

Exercise 2. Compare pairs of sentences, find the subject in each sentence, determine which of the questions is a question to the subject - a) or b), translate the sentences into English. In one of the pairs, both sentences are questions to the subject.

1. a) Who will you go with? versus b) Who will go
   with you?
2. a) What does he do? versus b) Who does it?
3. a) Who thought about his health? versus b) What did he think about?
4. a) Whose car did you scratch? versus b) Who
   scratched your car?
5. a) Which girl has served dinner? versus
   b) Who has to serve dinner?

1. a) Who will you go with? Who are you going with? versus b)
   Who will go with you? Who will go with you? b) - question to
   subject
2. What does he do? What is he doing? versus Who does it?
   Who does this? b) - question to the subject
3. Who thought about his health? Who thought about his
   health? versus What did he think about? What is he talking about
   thought? a) - question to the subject
4. a) Whose car did you scratch? Whose car are you
   scratched? versus b)Who scratched your car? Who
   scratched your car? b) - question to
   subject
5. Which girl has served dinner? Which of the girls
   have you served dinner? versus Who has to serve dinner? Who should
   Serve dinner? a) and b) - questions for
   subject

Exercise 3. Correct the mistakes.

1. Who likes to sing?
2. Who was in the park?
3. What does make you think so?
4. Who did see the accident?
5. What does need washing?
6. Who did make you feel disappointed?

School Mary Vanna has done her best to make you remember that every question in English must contain an auxiliary verb. And she cannot be blamed for this. But for some reason, a special type of question remains unattended - a question to the subject. It is not surprising that when studying the topic Subject Questions It is very difficult for many students to understand: How is this a special question and without an auxiliary verb?

Indeed, this type of question exists and is very often used. And, in order to correctly construct questions to the subject, you need to understand once and for all what subject and what is addition. Let's start with this.

Subject in a sentence - the one who acts, the actor, maybe not even a person, but an inanimate object. The subject always answers the question: Who? What? In terminology English grammar- This subject.

Addition in a sentence - this is the one to whom the action is directed. Answers case questions: Whom? What? To whom? Why? By whom? How? and so on. In English grammar terminology it is called object.

John called Kate.

Who acted in this situation, who called? John. This is subject. Who is the action aimed at, who did they call? Kate. This is object.

If we need to ask about any of them, we will use a question word who.

Let's say we know that John called someone. We ask: Who did John call?

Who did John call? —Who did John call?

This is an object question because we know the subject. The word order of this question is indirect; there is an auxiliary verb did that comes before the subject.
And we will answer this question like this:

Kate. John called Kate.

But if it's the other way around, we know that someone called Kate. How to ask who called her? In this matter, we need to find out who the actor was. Let's try this:

Who did Kate call? -Who did Kate call?

This question is grammatically correct, but similar to the one we asked above, just with a different name. In this case, from the question it turns out that Kate called someone, in this question Kate is the subject, the active person. But she didn’t call anyone, someone called her. The situation is distorted. We need another question.

Let's try it differently:

Who did call Kate?

This question is completely incorrect from a grammatical point of view. The word order is broken. First there should be a question word (who), then an auxiliary verb (did), then the subject... Stop, but we don’t have information about the subject, we just need to find out WHO called, who performed the action.

Finally, we come to the most basic thing.

To ask a question to the subject, we don't need to swap or add anything. You just need to replace the unknown subject with the question word who:

Somebody called Kate.

Who called Kate? -John. John called Kate.

The rule is very simple: if you need to find out who performed the action, then in the question, instead of the unknown subject, the question word who is put and the word order does not change.

As you can see, there is nothing complicated in constructing a question to the subject, but there is one more problem: how to distinguish subject question from object question? Let's look at the comparative characteristics again:

Let's imagine ourselves as extremely curious, and use examples to look at how to ask different types questions:

The thief stole his bag. - A thief stole his bag.

See you at the training!

It often happens that we need to find out who exactly performs (has performed or will perform) some action or who has some quality. In this case, the question is "Who is writing the letter?" (Who writes a letter?) or "Who was smart?" (Who was clever?). They are called special questions to the subject in English, begin with question words (who, what, where, where, how much, etc.) and are usually not particularly difficult. It’s safe to say that this topic is one of the easiest in the entire course. But at the same time, everyone who wants to master the language must learn to ask questions to the subject, since without this skill communicating in English is almost impossible. First you need to understand the terminology.

Members of the sentence

To designate the actor and action, the terms “subject” and “predicate” are used. Examples:

• He plays football (He plays football).

In this sentence, He is the subject (actor), plays is the predicate (action).

• She looks like an angel (She looks like an angel).

Here She is the subject, looks like is the predicate.

Another important concept is the question word. There are two such words: “who” and “what” - in questions to the subject in English. An example will help you understand the concepts discussed.

• Who has done a work? (Who has already done the work?).

They are laughing. (They are laughing.)

Who is laughing? (Who's laughing?)

Here many people make the mistake of using the auxiliary verb plural are. Under no circumstances should this be done!

In other varieties of the present tense, you need to act in a similar way.

Past tense

In this case, asking a question to the subject in English is even easier. There is no need to change anything except replacing the subject with a question word and, in some cases, replacing the auxiliary verb. As has already been repeatedly said and proven by examples, the predicate to the subject in questions must certainly be in the 3rd person and singular. number. So the auxiliary verb Were in interrogative sentence it shouldn't be!

So, let's get acquainted with the past tense. Examples of questions to the subject in English:

She was good to me. (She was kind to me.) - Past Simple.

Who was good to me? (Who's been good to me?)

They were waiting for him. (They were waiting for him a lot.) -

Who was waiting for him? (Who was looking forward to it?)

The summer had already gone (Summer has already passed). - Past Perfect.

Who had already gone? (What's already passed?)

Future

In the future tense, difficulties can arise only in its completed form.

You will have lost your money till Sunday. (You will have spent the money by Sunday).

Who will have lost your money till Sunday? (Who will spend the money before Sunday).

Answers

How to answer such questions? As easy as pie. In the colloquial version, the answer can be one word, that is, the subject itself, for example He, She, Uncle John, and so on.

But it would be most correct to adhere to the following scheme: “subject supplemented by an auxiliary verb.”

Who went skating yesterday? (Who went skating yesterday?)

Sam did. (Sam.)

Who is absent? (Who is absent?)

John is. (John.)

Now you know what you need to do to correctly ask a subject question in English. The examples given above should be reviewed again before starting the exercises. You should also repeat the question structure.

Questions to the subject in English. Exercises

1. Ask your friend who he likes to spend his free time with.
2. Ask a question to the following sentence: I want to live forever.
3. Correct the error: Who are glad to see me?
4. Answer the question: What is your favorite animal?
5. Translate into English: "Who will go to the beach tomorrow?"

Also practice asking questions to any sentences in English. This will help you bring the skill to the necessary automaticity.

The article discussed the topic of how to ask a question to a subject in English using examples. We hope that this information was simple, interesting and useful for you.

Good afternoon dear friends!

One of the most important skills in English is the ability to ask questions. It will be useful to you in any situation: if you want to meet someone, ask for directions, buy something in a store. Therefore, today I will tell you about a whole separate group - about questions to the subject in English.

From this article you will learn:

Let's understand the terms

First, let's define what a subject is. This is the subject who performs this or that action. It can be expressed in different parts speeches:

1. Nouns. The cat is sleeping (The cat is sleeping).
2. By proper name. Cindy likes oranges (Cindy loves oranges).
3. Pronoun. He is wearing a jacket (He is wearing a jacket).
4. Gerund. Talking on the phone is forbidden here.
5. Infinitive. To go jogging in the morning is very healthy (Going for a jog in the morning is very healthy).

We need this knowledge when this subject is not known or we want to clarify something about him. For example, someone broke a mug and you want to know. You will say angrily: Who broke the cup?

For this type of sentence, we only need two question words: Who (who), What (what). Remember the last lesson about?

Something is missing

Looking at their diagram, you may notice that the word order is not the same as in the special questions we are used to. Or rather, it looks more like a statement. How to ask a question to the subject in English? The rule is simple. Want modal verbs?

There is no need to remember auxiliary verbs here, as in other questions. They simply aren't here. All you need to do is replace the known subject with the word who or what. For example, Steve has got the keys. Steve is a subject. But if it is unknown to you, we get: Who has got the keys? (Who has the keys?). As you can see, only one word has changed. main parts of a sentence in English?

The difference between a subject question and a special question

Let's look at examples of questions to the subject in different grammatical tenses in the table:

How to answer them?

There are two ways to answer: short and long. The first contains only one word - the subject. For example, Who is talking on the phone? (Who's on the phone?) The answer is David. Have you repeated about articles for numerals?

The second contains the subject and auxiliary verb of the tense in which the sentence is constructed.

We get: David is.
Another example: Who sings this song? (Who sings this song?) Sandra/ Sandra does. By the way, remember about pronouns?

Don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss anything and receive a gift - a phrasebook in English, German and French. It has Russian transcription, so even without knowing the language, you can easily master colloquial phrases.

To remember

Now, so that everything is finally remembered, we will practice the acquired knowledge in the exercise. Translate the sentences into English:

1. What's in the bag?
   For example, What is in the bag?
2. Who will call Jim?
3. What happened to the computer?
4. Who turned off the light?
5. Who wants to go to the theater with me?
6. What's in the refrigerator?
7. Who broke the glasses?
8. Who watches football?

That's all. If you are interested in learning more about the English language, subscribe to the Viva Europe blog.

I was with you, a philologist of the English language, Ekaterina Martynova.
I wish everyone a good mood!