Ask Away! The Power of the Question Mark

Think about the last time you really wanted to find something out. Maybe you asked a friend, a parent, or a teacher. When we ask something, we use a special kind of sentence — a question. Questions need a special punctuation mark at the end. Can you guess what it is? Look at this sentence: 'Where do butterflies sleep?' Notice the curly symbol with a dot underneath at the end. That symbol is called a question mark. Today you are going to become a question-mark expert!

A question mark looks like this: ? It sits at the very end of a sentence that asks something. It takes the place of a full stop in that sentence — you never use both together. There are two main types of sentence to know about right now: 1. A STATEMENT tells you something. It ends with a full stop. Example: 'The cat sat on the mat.' 2. A QUESTION asks something. It ends with a question mark. Example: 'Did the cat sit on the mat?' How can you spot a question? Questions often start with special words called question words: Who, What, Where, When, Why, How, Is, Are, Do, Does, Can, Will. If your sentence starts with one of these words and is asking for information or an answer, it needs a question mark at the end. Remember: the question mark does TWO jobs at once. It tells the reader 'this sentence is asking something' AND it shows where the sentence ends. So you never add a full stop after a question mark. WORKED EXAMPLE: Look at these two sentences. Which one needs a question mark? A: 'Lions live in Africa.' B: 'Do lions live in Africa' Sentence A is a statement — it tells us a fact. It already has a full stop, so it is correct. Sentence B starts with 'Do' and is asking for an answer. It needs a question mark: 'Do lions live in Africa?' Top tip: Try reading the sentence aloud. Does your voice go up at the end, like you are waiting for an answer? If yes, it is probably a question!