Vault seed record
Indirect question word order
You need to ask politely about the meeting time.
Classification
Provenance
Kind: human-authored
Source: production-seed-expansion
Batch: production-seed-batch-002
Reviewer: content-lead
Updated: 2026-05-20
Instruction and answer
Instruction
Choose the correct sentence.
Correct answer
Can you tell me when the meeting starts?
Explanation
After 'Can you tell me...', the embedded question uses normal statement order: 'when the meeting starts'.
Product use
Surfaces
Source languages
Difficulty
medium
Conversion hook
A polite sentence that many learners are confident about and still miss.
Review payload
Review notes
Production-ready word-order seed.
Media prompt
No media prompt attached.
Assets
Source traps
Tags
Usage
Tests: word-order, grammar-diagnostic, business-english
Funnels: ru-translated-english, es-translated-english
Challenges: indirect-question-trap
{
"type": "single-choice",
"correctOptionId": "normal-order",
"options": [
{
"id": "normal-order",
"label": "Can you tell me when the meeting starts?",
"rationale": "Embedded questions use normal word order."
},
{
"id": "direct-order",
"label": "Can you tell me when does the meeting start?",
"rationale": "This keeps direct-question order inside an embedded question."
},
{
"id": "starts-it",
"label": "Can you tell me when starts the meeting?",
"rationale": "The subject should come before the verb."
},
{
"id": "is-start",
"label": "Can you tell me when is starting the meeting?",
"rationale": "This is not the natural verb pattern."
}
]
}