Interrogative pronouns “how” and “what… like”

 

Today we are going to look at how to form questions with the word “how” and the structure “what…like.”

Should we get started?

The question word “how” is very common in English and is used when we want to ask about someone’s health or about “how” they may be feeling.

When we meet someone normally we say:

How are you?

Or

How are things? (more informal)

The answer to these questions is normally:

I’m well / fine thank you

If we want to find out specific information about a person, situation or thing we would use “how” plus an adjective.

How big is your house?

It’s very big!

How tall are you?

I’m 1.84 meters tall

How old is she?

She’s 26 years old

Easy, right?

Now let’s look at the word “like” and how it is used in the following sentence; if you notice in the sentence below the word “like” is not the same as the verb “to like.”

I want a car like this one

The word “like” in this case is used to indicate similarity. As studied in Unit 18 of the Course we  use “what…like?” when talking about people or things and we need a more general description.

In the singular form we can contract “what is” so that it becomes “what’s” when inquiring information.

What’s the film like?

It’s great!

What’s he like?

He’s really nice.

What’s Thailand like?

Very beautiful.

However, hen we use the plural form we don’t use the contraction.

What are the people like?

They are very nice

What are the the Pyramids like?

They are amazing!

Keep on practicing and you will speaking fluently in no time!