How to Ask Questions Your Child Wants to Answer

There’s a saying in improv comedy that’s really helpful for parents: yes, and.

“Yes, and” is the golden rule for improv because it means you’re giving your scene partner something to work with to continue the scene. Here’s an example:

Player 1: Hello, is this Mario’s Pizzeria?

Player 2: Yes, and the special of the day costs $3.14.

Player 1: $3.14? What’s so special about that?

Player 2: It’s a pizza pi!

*pause for laughter*

Imagine if Player 2 didn’t follow the “yes, and” rule:

Player 1: Hello, is this Mario’s Pizzeria?

Player 2: No.

Player 1: … … ...

Player 1 has nothing to work with!

Conversations with your kiddo can sometimes sound like that too. Imagine this real-life scene from a day at camp:

Parent: How was camp?

Kiddo: Fine.

Parent: Did you meet any new friends?

Kiddo: Yeah.

Parent: What are their names?

Kiddo: Jared and Eli.

Parent: … … …

If you find yourself feeling frustrated with these kinds of conversations, you can start using a kind of “yes, and” with your kiddo with open-ended questions.

Open-ended questions model the skill of curiosity, which is the ability to approach the world and other people with wonder, interest, and intrigue.

For kids, curiosity provides an opportunity to expand their interest and creative thinking about their world and the people around them. 

Most open questions start with “why” or “how” such as:

• Why did you make that choice?

• How would you do that in the future?

• Why does that interest you?

• How did that make you feel?

Closed-ended questions may give you some useful or interesting information, but they don’t go very far when it comes to engaging discussion.

If you’re at a party and meeting someone new, you probably use a mix of open and closed questions to get to know the person.

“Where do you work?” (a closed question) might be followed up by “How did you get started in that field?”

You can use the same idea to facilitate engaging, productive conversations with your family.

Closed-ended questions tend to start with “who,” “what,” or “where,” such as:

• Who did you see there?

• What did you do today?

• Where do you want to go for dinner?

Basically, open-ended questions can’t be answered with a simple yes or no, or a few words.

We suggested that this HeyKiddo parent ask their camper more open-ended questions on their car ride on the way home the next day. Here’s how it went:

Parent: What was your favorite part of camp today?

Kiddo: We made our own butter in a jar!

Parent: That’s awesome! Why was that your favorite part?

Kiddo: Because we were in teams and I got to shake the jar when Jared’s arm got tired and I was like whaaaaaa *makes superhero shaking two jars at a time noise*

Parent: Sounds like you were a big help to your team! Very cool way to be a great leader.

Our HeyKiddo™ parent said this conversation was different from the first one because she learned something new about the emotions of her kiddo’s day and had a chance to see his happiness and pride in a way she might not have with an answer of “fine.”