Formation of WH Questions

Unlike Yes-No questions，which are about the whole sentence，WH questions focus on particular elements of a sentence.If a WH question is about the subject，the word order is simpler.Once a WH question word“who”or“what”replaces the subject，a new WH question is formed.When questions are about how/when/why/where the action(verb)has happened and on aspects about the object or other elements，the syntax is more complex.The rules require the insertion of an auxiliary verb，the inversion of subject and object and the application of WH question words to replace the elements being asked，plus subject-verb and number agreements，etc.

In sharp contrast，the wording for WH questions in Chinese needs much less explanation and deliberation.Again，we advise our students to start from the base model of a statement，which is exactly the response to the WH question.They need to fit all parts of the statement into the element columns in a table(as shown in Appendix 1)then underline a particular element that they want to question.Once they insert the right WH question word to replace the underlined element，a new WH question is thus formulated without any changes in the word order.