Indirect Questions

Indirect questions are the polite, professional alternative to direct questions — and one of the highest-leverage register shifts at B2. Where is the meeting room? becomes Could you tell me where the meeting room is? The key rule: no inversion, no auxiliary do / does / did — word order is subject + verb (statement order). Is the meeting still on? becomes Do you know if the meeting is still on? — using if or whether for yes/no questions. A bank of introductory phrases (Could you tell me…, Do you know…, I was wondering…, Would you mind telling me…, I’d like to know…) sets the polite register.

This worksheet drills B2 use of indirect questions in workplace, customer-service, and academic contexts.

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What’s inside:

• Grammar Box with the no-inversion rule, the if / whether yes/no marker, and the list of introductory phrases
• Direct-to-indirect transformation: rewrite eight direct questions with statement word order
• If or whether discrimination: choose between the two markers for yes/no indirect questions
• Production: rewrite a set of casual workplace requests as polite indirect versions
• Full Answer Key plus Teacher Notes on register and the academic-writing use of indirect questions

Common mistakes addressed: inversion kept in the indirect form (Could you tell me where is the office?), auxiliary kept (Do you know what does she mean?), missing if / whether in yes/no form (Do you know the meeting is on?), and missing question mark on the polite version.

For: Adult and teenage learners (14+) at CEFR B2, in upper-intermediate classes, 1:1 lessons, or self-study. Indirect questions are central to Cambridge B2 First (FCE) and C1 Advanced (CAE) Speaking — particularly the collaborative task, where polite formulations score directly on the Interactive Communication band. Part of the Question Forms collection — the natural sibling is Question Tags, which covers the casual-register counterpart to the polite form practised here.