How to Teach French Interrogative Words – A French Teacher’s Guide
Once my students know how to form basic French questions, I like to take the next step, which is teaching them how to ask questions that require more than a yes or no answer.
This is where interrogative words come in.
Students may already know:
Tu habites en France ?
Est-ce que tu habites en France ?
Habites-tu en France ?
Now I want them to be able to ask:
Where do you live?
Why do you live there?
When do you work?
Who are you going with?
This is where French question formation gets much more interesting!
Start With the Question Words
I introduce the most common interrogative words first:
qui — who
quoi — what
que / qu’ — what
quel / quelle / quels / quelles — what / which
quand — when
où — where
pourquoi — why
comment — how
à quelle heure — at what time
I don’t ask students to memorize a giant list. I introduce the words as students begin using them in actual questions.
French Forming Questions with Interrogative Words – French Grammar Activity
The First Thing I Teach Is Placement
This is probably the most important thing students need to understand.
They already know that French has three basic ways of forming questions:
intonation
est-ce que
inversion
When we add an interrogative word, its position depends on which question structure we’re using.
The basic pattern is:
Intonation: the interrogative word generally stays toward the end.
Est-ce que: the interrogative word goes at the beginning.
Inversion: the interrogative word goes at the beginning.
There is one important exception with pourquoi, which can occur at the beginning even with intonation.
I make this distinction very clear because students often assume that the question word must always go first, as it does in English.
Intonation
With intonation, the question word generally stays at the end of the sentence.
For example:
Jules est au magasin avec qui ?
Who is Jules at the store with?
The structure is very conversational and natural.
Another example:
Les enfants vont à l’école comment ?
How are the children going to school?
This is a great example for students because they can clearly see that comment doesn’t have to go at the beginning when they’re using intonation.
Est-ce Que
With est-ce que, the interrogative word goes at the beginning.
Avec qui est-ce que Jules est au magasin ?
With whom is Jules at the store?
And:
Comment est-ce que les enfants vont à l’école ?
How are the children going to school?
This is one reason I like teaching est-ce que before inversion. Students can keep the basic subject + verb word order they’ve already learned.
They simply put the interrogative word first and then add:
est-ce que + subject + verb
Inversion
With inversion, the interrogative word also goes at the beginning.
For example:
Avec qui Jules est-il au magasin ?
With whom is Jules at the store?
And:
Comment les enfants vont-ils à l’école ?
How are the children going to school?
The interrogative word comes first, and the verb and subject pronoun are inverted.
This is where I remind students of something we covered when learning inversion:
You cannot simply invert a noun and a verb.
You invert the subject pronoun and the verb.
So with:
Jules est…
we use:
Jules est-il… ?
And with:
Les enfants vont…
we use:
Les enfants vont-ils… ?
The noun stays in place, and the subject pronoun participates in the inversion.
French Forming Questions – Interrogative Words – 9 Dice Games
Then I Spend Time on “What?”
I find that what causes the most confusion because French has both quoi and que / qu’.
I teach them as two different structures rather than telling students that they’re interchangeable.
Quoi
quoi means what, but it does not go at the beginning of a basic question.
For example:
Tu achètes quoi au magasin ?
What are you buying at the store?
This is the type of structure students will hear frequently in conversational French.
Que / Qu’
que also means what, but this form goes at the beginning of the question.
For example:
Qu’est-ce que tu achètes au magasin ?
What are you buying at the store?
With inversion:
Qu’achètes-tu au magasin ?
What are you buying at the store?
I like putting these three versions together:
Tu achètes quoi au magasin ?
Qu’est-ce que tu achètes au magasin ?
Qu’achètes-tu au magasin ?
Students can see that all three ask essentially the same question, but the placement and structure are different.
I Make “Quoi” and “Que” a Special Focus
I don’t expect students to figure this distinction out simply by reading a vocabulary list. Instead, I give them lots of examples, and we always play a Jeopardy game to loosen things up and have a little fun with forming questions.
The simple rule I want beginners to remember is:
quoi = what, but not at the beginning
que / qu’ = what, at the beginning
So:
Tu fais quoi ?
but:
Que fais-tu ?
and:
Qu’est-ce que tu fais ?
Once students see enough examples, the distinction starts to become much more natural.
Then I Teach Quel + Être
Another structure I introduce separately is:
quel + être
This is used for questions such as:
Quel est votre magasin préféré ?
What is your favorite store?
I point out that quel is not simply another form of que.
Quel is an adjective.
That means it has to agree with the noun it modifies.
There are four forms:
quel — masculine singular
quelle — feminine singular
quels — masculine plural
quelles — feminine plural
For example:
Quel est ton livre préféré ?
What is your favorite book?
Quelle est ta couleur préférée ?
What is your favorite color?
Quels sont tes films préférés ?
What are your favorite movies?
Quelles sont tes activités préférées ?
What are your favorite activities?
This is a place where I slow down because students who are already confused about que / quoi / quel can easily lump all three together.
I want them to understand that quel is an adjective and therefore has to agree.
I Don’t Try to Teach Every Interrogative Structure at Once
This is one of those topics where it’s very easy to overwhelm beginners. I want students to understand the major patterns first.
Qui habite ici ?
Who lives here?
Quand est-ce que tu travailles ?
When do you work?
Où habites-tu ?
Where do you live?
Pourquoi est-ce que tu apprends le français ?
Why are you learning French?
Comment vas-tu ?
How are you?
À quelle heure est-ce que tu commences ?
What time do you start?
Once students are comfortable with the basic question words, I can introduce more complicated structures as they encounter them.
I Keep the Three Question Forms Together
I find it especially helpful to keep returning to the three basic forms students learned in the previous lesson.
For example, with où:
Tu habites où ?
Où est-ce que tu habites ?
Où habites-tu ?
Or with comment:
Tu vas au travail comment ?
Comment est-ce que tu vas au travail ?
Comment vas-tu au travail ?
This reinforces both lessons at the same time.
Students aren’t learning “interrogative words” as a completely separate topic.
They’re learning how to add information words to question structures they already know.
I Also Practice With Real Questions
Once the structures are established, I like moving away from translation exercises and letting students ask each other questions.
For example:
Où habites-tu ?
Avec qui habites-tu ?
Quand travailles-tu ?
Pourquoi apprends-tu le français ?
Comment vas-tu au travail ?
À quelle heure te lèves-tu ?
This gives students a reason to use the interrogative words rather than simply identify them on a worksheet.
It also creates a natural bridge into conversation.
Watch for These Common Mistakes
There are a few mistakes I expect beginners to make.
Putting every question word at the beginning
Students often assume:
Tu habites où ?
must become:
Où tu habites ?
That’s not the basic intonation structure I’m teaching.
With intonation, the question word generally stays toward the end.
Using quoi at the beginning
Students may try:
Quoi tu achètes ?
For the structures we’re teaching here, I want them to use:
Tu achètes quoi ?
or:
Qu’est-ce que tu achètes ?
or:
Qu’achètes-tu ?
Confusing que and quel
I remind students:
que / qu’ = what
quel / quelle / quels / quelles = what / which + noun
And quel must agree with the noun.
Forgetting the subject pronoun with inversion
Students may see:
Jules est au magasin.
and try to form:
Est-Jules…?
I remind them that inversion is between the verb and subject pronoun:
Jules est-il…?
My Teaching Sequence for French Interrogative Words
When I teach interrogative words, I generally follow this progression:
1. Review the three basic question structures.
Intonation, est-ce que, and inversion.
2. Introduce the most common interrogative words.
qui, quoi, que, quel, quand, où, pourquoi, comment, and à quelle heure.
3. Teach placement.
Show students where the question word goes with each question structure.
4. Spend extra time on quoi vs. que / qu’.
This is one of the areas beginners find most confusing.
5. Teach quel + être.
Make sure students understand that quel is an adjective and must agree.
6. Practice with real questions.
Let students use the words to get information from one another.
7. Keep recycling the three question structures.
This helps students understand that interrogative words are being added to a system they already know.
French Interrogative Words Resources for Teachers
Teaching interrogative words becomes much easier when students can see the different question structures side by side and then practice changing them.
I’ve created resources to help students practice French question words and the different ways they can be incorporated into questions.
Forming French Questions + Interrogative Words – PowerPoint Jeopardy Game
French Forming Questions with Interrogative Words – French Grammar Activity
French Interrogative Words and Questions Bundle
I find that the key is not trying to make students memorize a list of interrogative words. They need to learn where those words go and how they work within the French question structures they already know. Once that starts to click, asking questions becomes much more natural.
