english highway

English Highway Podcast Intonation: Question Intonation (#0303) Learn two different intonation patterns in questions.

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Welcome to a new audio lesson. I’m your head coach Andres Moreno. Today we're going to be working on intonation in questions.

Intonation helps us communicate our intentions. By emphasizing different words within the same sentence you can give it different meanings. The same thing happens with questions.

Sometimes we ask a question knowing what the answer will probably be. At other times, we ask questions because we really need the information. These two kinds of questions use different intonation patterns.

The most common intonation pattern for a question is the voice going up at the end. Listen carefully:

“Hi David. Do you have a minute?”

Notice how the voice goes up on the word “minute.” This indicates that we don’t know what David will say. Repeat the question after me:

“Hi David. Do you have a minute?”

On the other hand, when you say:

“Who’s the boss?”

The intonation pattern for this sentence implies that I already know who the boss is.

We have the choice to vary our intonation at the end of a question depending on what we want to communicate.

We could say, “Who’s the boss?” if we genuinely want to find out who the boss is.

It’s our choice, and depending on what pattern we use, the listener will get a different meaning.

Let’s try this with another sentence. Listen carefully:

“Maybe we could have some coffee?”

Try it out. Repeat after me:


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With this intonation pattern, we are saying: “I’m not sure. Is coffee okay with you? Do you have other ideas?”

If by contrast, we say it this way:


We’re actually saying: “I am confident that coffee is a good idea. I don’t think lunch or dinner would work. I can have an appropriate conversation with you over coffee.”

Now you try the second intonation. Repeat after me:


Come on, say it with confidence. Repeat after me:


Good job. Now let’s try the first intonation pattern. Repeat after me:


And again, repeat after me:


Good job. Now let’s try the second intonation pattern again. Repeat after me:

“Maybe we could have some coffee?”Good job. Here’s another question for you to practice. Listen carefully:

“Let’s go somewhere after work. Maybe dinner?”

The intonation changes depending on how confident you are of the answer.

If I’m not very confident of the answer, I would say:


If I’m confident about it, I would say:


Can you hear the difference? You try it. Repeat after me:

“Maybe dinner?”

And again:

“Maybe dinner?”


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Now with confidence:

“Maybe dinner?”

And again:

“Maybe dinner?”

Good job. Now let's practice the whole sentence. Repeat after me:


And here's the second intonation pattern. Repeat after me:


Great job. This has been a very useful lesson on the different intonation patterns used in questions. Listen to it a few more times and then try asking questions with different intonations patterns. See you next time and remember, practice makes perfect!For additional practice, turn on your computer and go to OpenEnglish.com. At OpenEnglish, you’ll find hundreds of interactive lessons and videos to help you perfect your English.Accelerate your English today. See you soon.

Additional practice: Intonation with questions

Sentences:“Hi David. Do you have a minute?”“Who’s the boss?”“Maybe we could have some coffee?” “Let’s go somewhere after work. Maybe dinner?”


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