Today I'm going to teach you a speaking skill that can help you improve your conversation with
English speakers it's how to answer negative questions before I get started I want to mention
that this tip or skill really depends on how negative questions are used in your first language
there are some languages for example like portuguese that use negative questions exactly the
same way that we use them in English and if that's the case for your first language then this tip
will be easy for you but some languages use them differently and this video should be very helpful
if this is your first time here welcome this channel is designed for English learners who
want to go to school or work in English i've been teaching English as a second language for
almost 25 years and on this channel I share tips for how to improve your writing reading speaking
pronunciation vocabulary and understanding of american culture so back to the video I got the
idea for this video because this is a very common mistake that my students make and the problem is
that it leads to misunderstanding so let me tell you a little story to help you understand how this
kind of situation would work one day a student of mine in my class did not have the textbook we
agreed that she would go to the bookstore the college bookstore after class to buy the book
so after class she went to the bookstore to buy the book and a few minutes later I left
and while I was walking to my office I saw the student leaving the bookstore but she didn't have
the book or a bag in her hand so what do you think that I was thinking
I was thinking that the bookstore had sold out or had run out of the book but I wasn't 100 sure
so I asked her this question they don't have the book and she answered yes so as you can imagine
this uh conversation left me feeling confused because I asked her they don't have the book
and when she answered yes I didn't understand yes they have the book or no they don't have the book
this kind of conversation happens often in English when I want to confirm or make sure
that something is true and it's something that's negative for example they don't have the book
I can ask a question like this they don't have the book
it's a statement but I use rising intonation at the end to show that it's a question
now the way to answer this is if it's true
that they don't have the book then the other person will answer no or no they don't however
if they have the book then the student or the person can say yes they do
so before we start practicing let me give you a couple of tips to help you understand more about
how to answer negative questions notice that we usually ask negative questions when we assume that
something negative is true for example they don't have the book when I saw my student with no book
in her hand I assumed that something negative they don't have the book was true therefore if
it's true that they don't have the book then you can just answer no or no they don't but if
the opposite is true if they have the book then we would emphasize this by saying yes they do or
actually they do we wouldn't probably just say yes we would probably emphasize it by saying
yes they do or actually they do for example maybe for some reason you assume that I don't have kids
so if you ask me you don't have kids I'm going to answer yes I do or actually I do I have two kids
another tip for answering negative questions is to pay attention to the helping verb that is used
in the question in our example they don't have the book the helping verb is don't so when you
answer the question you're going to use the same helping verb no they don't or yes they do
of course it's hard to hear all these little words in conversation
so if you hear a negative question but you don't catch the helping verb you can do a couple of
things one thing is that you can just use no or yes or you can say the whole sentence so again
going back to our example they don't have the book maybe you hear that it's a negative question but
you don't hear the helping verb so you can just say no they don't have the book or simply no
so let's practice answering four negative questions we'll just do them quickly and
then we'll look at each one in more detail the first one is you didn't get the job
no I didn't you don't have enough money no I don't the computer isn't working
no it isn't you're not feeling well no I'm not so let's look at each of these
in more detail for the first one let's imagine that your friend applied for a job last week
and today you see your friend and your friend looks like this what do you think happened
probably your friend didn't get the job so you can ask you didn't get the job and your friend will
probably answer no I didn't let's try another one my friend and I are going to the movies I bought
my ticket first and I noticed that my friend is standing at the cashier for a long time he's
looking through his wallet and finally he takes out some money but he doesn't buy his ticket
what do I think well I think that maybe he doesn't have enough money so I ask him you don't have
enough money and he answers no I don't and I say oh no problem I'll buy your ticket for you
let's try two more let's imagine that you are in a classroom and the teacher is teaching the
students how to use a computer program and all the students are working fine but there's one
student who is having problems what do you think happened maybe he can't log on the computer
or maybe the computer isn't working or maybe the program isn't working so the teacher can
go to the student and ask you can't log on and the student says no I can't or the teacher asks
the computer isn't working and the student can say no it isn't
finally imagine that you come home from school and you see your roommate like this
probably she is not feeling well so you can ask her you aren't feeling well and she can say
no I'm not I have a bad headache
so remember that the best way to learn English is to practice it so the next time that you are
having a conversation with an English speaker try to use a negative question and notice how
the other person answers it also the next time that you hear an English conversation
keep your ears open for negative questions maybe one of the speakers will ask a negative question
and the other person will answer it and you can pay attention to how they
ask and answer if you enjoyed this video please hit the like button
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