Questions to ask your teenager

14 questions to ask your teenager about pets and animals

People who will not talk about themselves will talk about a dog. These questions use the animals of a life to reach the houses, the family and the losses around them. Ask in the car or while doing something else. Eye contact is the enemy of a teenager's honesty.

How to use this list. Ask by voice and record it. One or two questions a visit is plenty; the follow-up ("Who else was there?" "What did she say?" "What happened the day after?") matters more than the next question.

1. If you could have any animal as a best friend, which one, and what would you do together on a Tuesday?
2. What does the animal you know best do when it thinks nobody is watching?
3. If you had to be an animal for a whole day, which one, and where would you go first?
4. Tell me about a time an animal surprised you.
5. What is the biggest animal you have ever touched? What did it feel like?
6. What animal are you scared of, and what would make you less scared of it?
7. If a dog could talk, what would it say to you first?
8. What animal lives near our house that most people never notice?
9. What would you name a pet dragon, and where would it sleep?
10. Have you ever looked after an animal? What did you have to do every day?
11. Which animal from a story or a film do you wish was real?
12. If you found a lost animal on the way home, what would you do first?
13. What is the funniest thing you have ever seen an animal do?
14. Which animal do you think is most like you? What do you both do?A child's self-portrait, in one animal.

What these questions are for

A good book about a person needs more than facts. It needs the person on the page: how they talked, what they wanted, what they did when it mattered, the story that shows them. These questions cover 10 of the things a writer needs about your teenager: loves and tastes, how others saw them, wants, fears and wounds, the story that shows them, objects, places, food, music, their voice and sayings, habits, routines and work, beliefs and values, temperament and humour, who they are.

More questions to ask your teenager

• All questions to ask your teenager
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• Questions to ask your teenager that go deep
• Questions to ask your teenager for a quick conversation
• Questions to ask your teenager about the houses they lived in
• Questions to ask your teenager about their school days
• Questions to ask your teenager about music, dancing and going out
• Questions to ask your teenager about friendship

Or see questions for everyone else, and how to interview a parent about their life.