Simple questions in French: est-ce que, où and qui

Level A1

Simple questions in French: est-ce que, où and qui

You are visiting a workplace with someone you know and want to find out who works there. Use a familiar sentence to check a fact, or ask for the missing place or person, then answer with a short subject–verb sentence. Allow about ten minutes, or eighteen with listening and repetition.

Start with sentences you know

Listen to the cards: je is I, tu is you when speaking to one person you use tu with, and parle/parles means speak. Français is French, travaille means work, ici is here, and à la maison is at home. Je ne travaille pas ici means I don't work here: ne and pas surround travaille. Oui is yes and non is no; keep these familiar words ready for the questions.

Keep the words and change the voice

Compare Tu parles français. (You speak French.) with Tu parles français ? (Do you speak French?). In this everyday yes/no question the word order stays the same; a rising voice at the end can signal the question, and writing adds a question mark. Unlike an ordinary English question with do, French does not insert an equivalent of do here. Answer about yourself with Je parle français: the question's tu becomes je in your answer, and written parles becomes parle, with the same sound.

Tu parles français / travailles ici ?

Put est-ce que before the familiar sentence

Est-ce que tu travailles ici ? asks Do you work here?, and Est-ce que tu parles français ? asks Do you speak French?. Treat est-ce que as a question frame, without translating its pieces; after it, keep tu before the verb. The frame itself is common and neutral; these examples still address someone as tu. To the first question, answer Oui, je travaille ici, or deny it with Je ne travaille pas ici; oui or non can stand alone, but here practise a subject and verb too. English can answer Yes, I do; the French model repeats travaille rather than translating do as faire.

Est-ce que tu travailles ici / parles français ?

Ask for a place with où, a person with qui

Où means where: recall Où est le livre ? (Where is the book?) and Il est sur la table (It's on the table), with il standing for the masculine noun livre. To ask where an action happens, put où before the frame: Où est-ce que tu travailles ? (Where do you work?). Answer with the place in a sentence: Je travaille à la maison (I work at home). Qui means who: Qui travaille ici ? asks which person works here. In this question qui itself is the subject, so use travaille as with il and do not add il to the question. You can point to a man and answer Il travaille ici (He works here): où asks for a place, qui for a person, so oui alone would not supply the missing information.

Recognition only: the reversed order

You may see Travailles-tu ici ? with the verb before tu and a hyphen between them. It asks the same question using inversion, a more formal sentence structure; tu still addresses the same familiar person, so inversion does not turn tu into polite vous. Recognize it for now and use either of the two question patterns above when speaking.

Your turn: find out who works here

At a workplace, Ana asks Léo about his work; at the end he points to Marc. Before reading the dialogue, ask with est-ce que whether Léo works here, answer for him that he does not, ask where he works, answer that he works at home, then ask who works here and point to Marc in the answer. Listen to the six lines and take each part in turn, keeping je in the answers about yourself. Then ask about speaking French once with intonation and once with est-ce que; use the earlier examples to check. To review: check a fact with intonation or est-ce que, ask a place with où and a person with qui, and give a short sentence with a subject and verb.

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