hi my name is Rebecca and in today's
lesson I'm going to teach you about
embedded questions in the present simple
tense and in the past simple tense okay
so what is an embedded question an
embedded question is a question that is
hidden inside another question or inside
a sentence and what happens is that when
you have an embedded question you have
to change the word order back to that of
a sentence rather than that of a
question and that's what makes it a
little bit confusing or quite confusing
for many students because you've learned
that when you have a question you change
the order but in an embedded question
like the ones I'm about to show you you
have to change the order back more or
less to a regular sentence order so
let's look at some examples you'll
understand that okay all right so let's
take this present simple question where
does he live
right where does he live well that is
correct the way it is but if you add
before that one of these expressions
like can you tell me do you know could
you tell me would you know would you
happen to know if you add one of these
type of expressions before the question
then you're going to have to change
something here so let's look at this one
and let's look at the embedded question
version where does where did he live or
can you tell me where he lives right you
see what happened we lost that word does
and we came back to he lives with an S
right looks like we would be if it was a
sentence so do you know where he lives
okay could you tell me where he lives
would you know where he lives
would you mind telling me where you live
okay something like that the mistake
that's made
is that students sometimes say can you
tell me where does he live right so they
take the question from up here and they
leave it the same even with the tech but
you can't do that you need to change
let's look now at a past simple question
okay a question in the past simple pens
might be where did he work
right so you'll have to use the word did
in that question but in an embedded
question in the past simple tense it
would sound like this could you tell me
where he worked right could you tell me
where he worked not where did he work
not could you tell me where did you work
but could you tell me where he worked
just as when you were saying the
sentence okay let's look at a few more
examples now this also applies not only
when you have these kind of questions
kind of expressions before but also
within certain kinds of sentences like I
know where he lives or I don't know
where he lives or I don't remember where
he worked okay so even in certain kinds
of sentences when you have that embedded
question you change the order like into
something like this okay all right let
me give you a few examples and then you
can hopefully understand a little better
so if you said if you take the regular
question how do birds fly right how do
birds fly well if you wanted to change
that into an embedded question you'd say
do you know how birds fly okay do you
know how birds fly next one when does
the concert begin all right regular
question when does the concert begin
when does the concert begin becomes
could you tell me when the concert
begins okay so that's an embedded
question next one why did they why do
they miss class today
right that's in the past tense past
simple why did they miss class today
could you tell me why they missed class
today
right here we have the embedded version
last one what time did you finish work
could you tell me what time you finished
work okay I know it takes some getting
used to it's a little bit confusing so
if you'd like to have some more practice
please go to our website wwlp.com
there you'll find a quiz on this and
many other topics in English and you can
practice this it is an important point
because if you make that mistake of
saying this question with the embedded
version then it's really completely
wrong so practice this a lot and I'm
sure you'll get ok all the best with
your English
you