What's up guys this video is going to explain how to make yes-or-no
Questions in English I'm going to teach you the rules and in the end, I will show you one simple secret
That's going to make asking questions easy, and of course we're going to learn using music
As you know I believe that music is the best way of learning a language
So I have a lot of songs for you in this video, so if you don't like this song
Don't worry. You can pick one or two of the other songs that you like and use those to practice your questions now
In order to form a yes/no question in English you need to do what is called
Subject-Auxiliary inversion. I know that might sound complex, but I'm going to explain it in simple terms
Yes/no questions in English are actually based off of simple sentences
Most sentences in English have a subject first than a verb, but when we make a yes/no question
We move one of the verbs to the front of the sentence, and then the subject comes after
Now let's take a look at a few different types of yes/no questions you can ask
The main thing to think about when you're making a yes/no question is what kind of verb you're using
There are three basic types of verbs to think about when you're making a yes/no question
state of being verbs
Auxiliary verbs and all other kinds of verbs now. I'm going to explain what the difference between these verbs are the
First type of question we will look at uses the state of being verb
State of being verbs are any of the verbs on this list and
are is
was were and be
so let's take a simple sentence that uses one of these verbs I
am
Wrong of course. This is something that I would never say but some people do say it and
In order to turn this sentence into a question. We simply move the verb to the front of the sentence
It's that easy now
It's a question that asks am I wrong and this happens to be the name of the song that we're listening to right now
Here are some other songs you can listen to to practice your state of being verb questions
Let's move on to the next type of yes/no question this type of question
uses auxiliary verbs
an
auxilary verb is a smaller verb that comes before another verb and
modifies the meaning a little bit you might have also heard these called helping verbs or
Modal verbs all these terms mean basically the same thing
Here is a list of auxiliary verbs that you might run into
Can could do have may might must?
Should will now when you have a sentence with an auxiliary verb and a normal verb we are going to take the auxilary
Verb only and put that at the beginning of the sentence
So take the sentence you can feel the love tonight
Now in order to make a yes/no question out of this sentence
We simply take the first verb can and put it in front we now have
Can you feel the love tonight and that's a question?
Here are some other songs that can help you practice your questions with auxiliary verbs
The last type of yes/no questions you need to know about is the group of all other
Verbs I'm not going to make a list of the verbs in this group because there are
millions of them when we have a sentence that doesn't have an auxiliary
verb
We have to add an auxilary verb in order to make a question now
No matter what the sentence is you can almost always add one of the do verbs and it will still be correct
there that looks better so
Let's take a simple sentence like this you want to build a snowman
Now the verb want is all by itself there with no other verbs to keep it company
So let's add the word do now
This is still a correct sentence in the English language and we can treat it just like any other sentence that has two verbs
That means in order to make this a question
We have to move the do to the front of the sentence and we get do you want to build a snowman
I
Want to point out that you have to include the word do here?
It is not correct if you say want you build a snowman
That sounds really weird to an English speaker
Here are some other songs that might help you with these types of questions
Now that we know all the rules let's take a moment to practice
So far we've been looking at songs that have questions in the titles now
Let's take a look at some songs that have simple sentences in their titles and we're going to change them into questions
This sentence uses a state of being verb is
So we're going to take that verb and put it at the beginning of the sentence now the question that we have is is
having a place on earth I
Want to hold your hand now
Oana is just a fast way of saying want to
Since want is not a state of being verb and it's not one of our auxiliary verbs
We have to add the auxiliary verb do then we move due to the beginning of the sentence do I want to hold your hand
Now that is kind of a weird thing to ask someone, but it is a correct sentence in the English language
Next we're gonna take the Sun. I will survive
Survive is our main verb so we're gonna take the auxiliary verb will and put that at the beginning of the sentence
Will I survive?
Hopefully that's not something you will ever have to ask
I don't want to miss a thing in this case we already have an instance of the auxiliary verb do as
part of the word don't
So we're gonna take that word and put it at the beginning of the sentence don't I want to miss a thing
Now I don't know when you would ask this, but at least it's grammatically correct. You're the one that I want
now the verb in this sentence is the word AR and that's part of the
Contraction you're and since R. Is a state of being verb we're just gonna move that to the front
Are you the one that I want here's the last one?
We didn't start the fire now the main verb is starts in the auxiliary verb is did
Which is part of the word didn't?
So we're gonna take that contraction and move to the front didn't we start the fire
Now there's one last thing that I want to mention before we go and it's very
Important the other thing we do to make a yes/no question is raise our voice at the end of the phrase it goes like this
Pay attention to my voice at the end of the sentence when I ask these questions
Do you believe in magic?
Do you want to dance is?
It over have you ever seen the rain is?
heaven a place on earth in
Fact this is even more important than any of the other rules we learned earlier
And here's the secret that is going to help you with your English questions
This is a way to cheat if you forget some of the rules, and you don't remember how to make a correct English question
Just use the rising voice with a statement, and it will still be a correct question in English
For example you believe in magic you want to build a snowman
you can feel the love tonight I
am wrong
Heaven is a place on earth
These are all
grammatically correct questions in English
Now you should still try to remember the rules because these are a much more common way of asking
Questions in English and they will make you sound more like a native speaker, but in an emergency situation
When you forget the rules you can always resort to this
So, thanks for watching my video remember to keep listening to the songs and practicing your English, I'll see you guys next time