Good Questions to Ask Teens
Good questions to ask teens, written for parents first and just as usable by a teacher, coach, relative or youth leader. The 80 questions run from easy openers through school, friends and family to the future and how your teen is really doing. Each has a note on what to listen for, what to ask next or when to leave it alone, and the guide below covers the questions teens ask back. Ask two or three in a sitting, not the list.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Openers
What was the best part of your day, and what was the hardest part?
Why ask it
It asks for two small facts where "How was your day?" asks for a verdict. The hard part often comes out only because the good part was asked for first, so hear both and resist fixing the second one on the spot.
What song have you had on repeat this week?
Why ask it
"This week" is easier to answer than naming a favorite, and what a teenager is playing on a loop often tracks how the week has felt. Ask to hear thirty seconds of it and keep your review to yourself.
If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go first?
Why ask it
The place matters less than the reason: a city from a show, the country a friend's family comes from, a beach, somewhere with snow. Ask what they would do on the first morning there, and keep the answer in mind if a nearer version of the trip is ever possible.
What is the best part of being a teenager, and what is the worst?
Why ask it
Adults picture these years through their own, so the answer is a correction as much as a reply. Listen for whether the worst part is one that passes with age, like not being able to drive, or one that is happening to them now, like being watched or being left out.
What is something you could teach me in ten minutes?
Why ask it
They get to be the expert, and the skill they offer (a game mechanic, a braid, a chord, a camera trick) is one they feel sure of. Take the lesson and be a willing beginner, because that is the half that counts.
If you could have any superpower, which one would you choose?
Why ask it
A classroom and dinner-table standard because nobody can get it wrong. The use they have in mind says more than the power: invisibility to get out of a room, flight to get away, mind reading to find out what people think of them. Ask what they would do with it first.
What is the best thing you have ever bought with your own money?
Why ask it
Money they earned or saved tends to go on what they care about, so the answer is a short list of priorities: sneakers, a game, a concert ticket, a gift for someone. Ask how long it took to save for, and say nothing about the price.
What food could you eat every day for a month without getting sick of it?
Why ask it
There is no wrong answer and nothing to guard, so it can work even on a teenager who is in no mood to talk. It is also practical: make or buy the thing some time soon and say nothing about why.
If someone handed you a million dollars tomorrow, what is the first thing you would do with it?
Why ask it
Ask for the first three things, since the first is usually for themselves and a later one is often for somebody else. A teenager who would pay off a bill for a parent has probably heard more of the money talk at home than anyone thought.
What is the funniest thing that has happened to you this month?
Why ask it
A story is easier to hand to an adult than an opinion, and a month gives them enough to choose from. Notice who else is in it, since those are the people their weeks are spent with.
What is the most embarrassing thing that has happened to you at school?
Why ask it
Only ask it after telling one of your own, and make yours worse. The story they pick is usually one they have already made peace with, so laugh along with them and never repeat it in front of anyone else.
What is the best thing you have watched lately, and would I last ten minutes of it?
Why ask it
The joke in the last part is on you, which is a good footing for the adult asking the questions. If they say you would hate it, ask them to choose an episode and test the theory together.
If you could have dinner with anyone, living or dead, who would you invite?
Why ask it
A musician, an athlete, a streamer, a great-grandparent they never met: the guest shows who they are curious about. Then ask what their first question at the table would be, which is the harder and better half.
What is the most overrated thing people your age are into right now?
Why ask it
Teenagers tend to have sharp opinions about their own generation's fads and are rarely asked for them. Here they are the critic instead of the subject, and you hear what is going around without pretending you already knew.
If you could get out of one thing this week with no consequences, what would it be?
Why ask it
Asked as a game, it finds what is weighing on the week: a test, a practice, a presentation, a family visit. Skip the speech about commitments and ask what would make it less bad, which is sometimes as small as a ride there.
Would you rather be famous for one thing or really good at five things nobody knows about?
Why ask it
A choice is easier than an open question when someone is tired. Their pick says something about how they feel about being watched, which at their age is a daily matter and not a hypothetical. Ask what the one thing, or the five, would be.
What would be in your perfect day, from waking up to going to bed?
Why ask it
The schedule is the fun part: when it starts, what gets eaten, how much of it is spent doing nothing. Who appears in the day and who does not is the part to remember, and one piece of it can often be arranged for real.
School
If you ran your school for a month, what is the first thing you would change?
Why ask it
A complaint is one of the easier honest answers a teenager can give an adult. What they pick is a clue: the start time may be about tiredness, a rule about feeling controlled, a subject about boredom. Do not defend the school.
Which class goes by fastest, and which one drags?
Why ask it
Time is a more honest measure than "favorite". Ask what happens in the fast one, whether it is the teacher, the people in the room or the work itself. A class that drags could be dull or could be one where they are lost, and those call for different help.
Which teacher do you respect most, and what do they do differently?
Why ask it
Respect is not the same as liking, and many teenagers are exact about the difference. Answers are often about fairness or about being treated as capable, which doubles as a description of what they want from other adults, you included.
What do you want to learn that school does not teach?
Why ask it
The answers are often practical: money, cooking, cars, video editing, a language. Most of those can be started at home or with a relative who knows how, so offer a first lesson instead of praising the idea.
What was the last thing you learned that you kept thinking about afterward?
Why ask it
Somewhere recently something caught, in a classroom or out of one, and a video or a friend counts just as much as a teacher. Ask them to explain it to you, and let them correct you when you get it wrong.
What do you do when you do not understand something in class?
Why ask it
The options are few: ask the teacher, ask a friend, look it up later, or let it go. Letting it go is the hardest to see from outside, and it is how a small gap can turn into a subject they say they hate. Ask what would make asking easier.
What is stressing you out most about school right now?
Why ask it
Naming one thing turns a general weight into a problem with edges: a test on Friday, a group project where a partner does nothing, a teacher they think dislikes them. Ask what the next two weeks look like, because school stress is often several deadlines landing at once.
When you get a grade you did not want, how long does it stay with you?
Why ask it
Some teenagers shrug a grade off by lunch and some carry each one around as a verdict, and the second kind often look fine from outside. An answer in days tells you how much weight the marks have. If you are the adult who asks about grades most, hear all of it before you explain yourself.
What do you do outside class that you would keep doing even if it counted for nothing?
Why ask it
Plenty of what fills a teenager's week is done for a record or for an adult. The team, club, job or hobby they would keep with no credit attached is the one they like, and the one to protect when the schedule gets tight.
Friends
Who is your closest friend right now, and what do you like most about them?
Why ask it
"Right now" allows for the name having changed since you last heard one. The second half is the useful part: what they prize in a friend (funny, loyal, never makes a big deal of things) is often a fair sketch of what they want to be themselves.
Which of your friends would I like most, and which one would worry me?
Why ask it
Playful on the surface, and it has them describe their friends through an adult's eyes, which they have probably done in private already. Do not act on the second name. Turn it into a rule about who they can see and it is the last honest answer you get.
What makes someone a good friend, in your experience?
Why ask it
"In your experience" asks for evidence instead of a slogan. What they put first is often what they have recently had or recently missed: loyalty after being let down, honesty after being talked about. Ask who taught them that.
How is your friend group different from a year ago?
Why ask it
Friendships reshuffle a lot in these years and adults tend to find out months later. A plain factual question lets them report a drift or a falling-out without having to call it a loss. Ask who they miss.
When friends fall out, do you end up in the middle or stay out of it?
Why ask it
Peacemaker, bystander, or the one who picks a side: the answer is the part they play in the group. Peacemakers often carry more than they let on, so if that is theirs, ask what it costs and who does the same for them.
What is something you only do because your friends do?
Why ask it
This is peer pressure without the phrase. Most answers are harmless: a show, a brand, a sport they do not much like. A calm reaction to the small ones is what makes a bigger one sayable later.
Which app would be hardest to give up, and is it for talking to people or for scrolling?
Why ask it
The same app is a social lifeline for one teenager and background noise for another, so the use tells you more than the name. If it is where their friends are, time on it is time with friends, and it is fair to count it that way before anyone talks about limits.
How different are you in the group chat from how you are face to face?
Why ask it
Many teenagers are funnier, bolder or quieter in a chat than in a room and can describe the difference exactly. Neither version is fake, so do not ask which is real. Ask which one takes more effort to keep up.
Is anyone giving you, or someone you know, a hard time at school or online?
Why ask it
"Or someone you know" lets them tell it at one remove, and it may or may not turn out to be their own story. If it is theirs, ask what they want done before you contact a school or another parent, since going over their head can make the next thing go unsaid. A threat to their safety is the exception.
How do people your age start going out with each other now, and what do you make of it?
Why ask it
Asking how it works for their year, and not whether they like anyone, keeps it answerable. You learn the customs and the vocabulary, and the personal version can arrive when they choose. Do not tease, then or later.
What do you believe that most of your friends do not?
Why ask it
Holding a view that costs something socially is one of the harder parts of these years, and this asks whether they have one. Whatever they say, argue with it as little as possible, or you have shown them what disagreeing costs.
Who feels like they really understand you?
Why ask it
Expect a friend or a sibling before a parent, which is ordinary and not a verdict on you. If nobody comes to mind, take it seriously and come back to it another day instead of volunteering yourself on the spot.
Family
What does your family do together that you would miss if it stopped?
Why ask it
Teenagers seldom admit to liking anything a family does, and the hypothetical gives them cover to say it. The answer is usually small: a takeout night, a drive, a show watched together. Keep it off the list of things that get cancelled when life is busy.
What is your favorite family memory?
Why ask it
The one they keep is often not the expensive trip: it may be a power cut, a wrong turn, a meal that went badly and got funny. Ask what made it stick, and do not correct the details, because their version is the one that counts.
What does a friend's family do that you wish yours did?
Why ask it
By this age they have eaten at enough other tables to compare: a louder dinner, a slower Sunday, a parent who jokes, a house where friends can just turn up. Hear it as a request and not as a complaint about you. One of them is probably cheap to try.
Who in your family are you most like, and are you happy about it?
Why ask it
The name is the easy part and the verdict is the answer. Being told they are just like a parent or a sibling can land as a compliment or as a sentence, and it helps to know which before anyone says it to them again.
What is one house rule you would rewrite, and what would you put in its place?
Why ask it
Asking for the replacement turns a complaint into a proposal, and the proposal is often more reasonable than adults expect. A parent does not have to agree on the spot: take the draft seriously and name the day you will come back with an answer.
When do you most want adults to leave you alone, and when do you want them around?
Why ask it
Plenty of teenagers want both, and the timing is the part adults tend to get wrong. The answer can be very exact: not straight after school, yes late at night, never in front of friends. You can put it to use the same evening.
What do you do for yourself now that someone used to do for you?
Why ask it
Laundry, alarms, appointments, getting themselves across town: independence they have already taken on, which adults tend to notice later than the teenager does. Saying it out loud is a form of credit, and it leads straight to what they would like to handle on their own next.
Who do you look up to, and what is it about them?
Why ask it
It may be a cousin a few years older, a coach, a creator they follow or a character in a book, and all of them count. The quality they name (calm, funny, does not care what people think) is likely one they are working toward, so ask when they have seen that person show it.
What is one piece of advice from an adult that you have actually used?
Why ask it
"Actually used" filters out everything they nodded through. Advice that survives tends to be short and to have come from someone who was not lecturing at the time, so note who said it and when. That is the format to copy.
Has an adult ever said sorry to you and meant it?
Why ask it
If they can think of one, the story shows what a real apology looks like to them. If they cannot, that is an answer too. Should you owe them one yourself, this is a fair moment to make it, briefly and without a "but".
Which adult outside your family would you go to with a problem?
Why ask it
An aunt, a coach, a friend's mother, a teacher: some things are easier to take to an adult who is not a parent. If there is a name, be glad and not hurt. If there is not, a parent can quietly make more room for one of those people.
What do you wish your parents or teachers understood about you?
Why ask it
Asking about them, and not about teenagers in general, gets a narrower and more useful answer: that they are trying, that they are tired, that the quiet is not sulking. A parent should expect a softened version and treat it as the start of the answer.
What is one thing I could do differently that would make things easier for you?
Why ask it
"One thing" keeps it small enough to answer and small enough to do: knock first, hold the homework question until after dinner, stop narrating their life to relatives. Do it without announcing it, and ask again in a month.
What is one question you have always wanted to ask me?
Why ask it
They have been answering yours, so the turn is owed. It may be about what you were like at their age, a decision you made, or something in the family nobody explains. Answer it straight, or say you need time and name when you will.
Future
What are you trying to get better at right now, just for yourself?
Why ask it
"Just for yourself" rules out the goals adults have set for them. Note whether the answer is a skill or a trait, since wanting to be less anxious or more organized is a different conversation from wanting a better free throw.
What do you want to do after high school?
Why ask it
The standard question, and it lands better with no follow-up about how realistic the answer is. "I do not know" is a complete answer at fifteen and at eighteen. If there is a plan, ask what first put it in their head, not what it pays.
What job would you try for a week just to see what it is like?
Why ask it
A week is a trial, so they can name something unlikely without having to defend it, which "what do you want to be" never allows. Ask which part appeals: the work itself, the people, the money or the place.
What would you do with your first real paycheck?
Why ask it
Spend it, save it, give some away, or a split they have already worked out: the plan shows how they think about money. It is also an easy way to find out what they think things cost, which goes better as curiosity than as a talk about budgeting.
If money and grades were no object, how would you spend the year after you finish school?
Why ask it
Take away the two limits that shape most plans and you hear the wish before the compromise. There is no need to point out what is unrealistic. Ask which part of it could be tried on a small scale this year.
Where do you see yourself in ten years?
Why ask it
Asked as a picture and not a plan, it gets a city, a kind of home, who is around and what a weekday looks like. Notice what is in it besides work. If they cannot see that far, shorten it to the summer after next.
Who do you know whose life looks like success to you?
Why ask it
A person is easier to describe than a definition, and the choice shows what they are measuring: money, freedom, being good at one thing, being liked. If it is someone they only know from a screen, ask what they imagine that person's ordinary Tuesday is like.
What do you want your life to have in it that your parents' lives do not?
Why ask it
Teenagers watch adult lives closely and draw conclusions: more time, more travel, different work, less worry about money. A parent hearing this should take it as information and not as criticism, because getting defensive ends the answer.
What is one thing on your bucket list?
Why ask it
The phrase gives a daydream permission to be said out loud: a concert, a mountain, a country, a road trip with no adults in the car. Ask which item could happen before they turn twenty, and whether they would want company for it.
If you could fix one thing about the world, where would you start?
Why ask it
"Where would you start" keeps it from becoming an essay answer. Some begin with people near them, a friend's situation or their own street, and some with a law or a system. Either is a way in to what they have been reading and arguing about.
What part of being an adult are you not looking forward to?
Why ask it
Expect something practical: bills, phone calls to strangers, cooking every night, a job they dislike. Most of those are skills, so you can offer to show them one this month.
What scares you most about the next few years?
Why ask it
The next few years are close enough to be real: exams, leaving home, friends scattering, not knowing what they want. Reassurance is something they have already heard, so stay with the fear a while and ask which part they think about most.
What is the next thing on your calendar that you are counting down to?
Why ask it
A date gives you something concrete to ask about again: a trip, a game, a release, a birthday, the end of exams. If there is nothing at all, that flatness is worth noticing, and worth answering by putting one small thing on the calendar together.
Feelings
What are you most proud of from this past year?
Why ask it
Give it a moment, because the first answer is often the one adults have already praised. What follows the pause tends to be something nobody saw: finishing a thing they wanted to quit, apologizing first, staying out of a fight. Say you had not known, and leave it at that.
What can you do now without thinking that used to be hard?
Why ask it
A serve, a recipe, a piece of music, talking to customers at a weekend job: proof from their own life that hard things stop being hard. Remember the example, because it persuades better than encouragement the next time they say they cannot do something.
What is something you did this year that scared you a little beforehand?
Why ask it
A tryout, a presentation, a first shift, telling a friend no. Ask what they said to themselves in the minute before, because that sentence is the one to hand back to them ahead of the next hard thing.
What has made you really happy lately?
Why ask it
"Lately" asks for an instance instead of a list of favorites, and an instance has a place and a person in it. If nothing comes to mind, do not supply suggestions. Ask again another week, and if the blank lasts, mention it to their doctor or a school counselor.
What is one thing you are grateful for this week?
Why ask it
Asked once in a while it gets a real answer; asked every night at dinner it becomes a chore with a correct response. Go first with something small and true, a parking space or a friend's text, so that theirs does not have to be noble.
After a bad day, what gets you back to normal fastest?
Why ask it
The question assumes they already know something about looking after themselves. Listen for whether it settles them (music, a run, a shower, a friend) or only puts the problem off. Either way you learn what to offer, in their words, the next time they come home silent.
How have you been sleeping lately?
Why ask it
Easier to answer than a question about mood, and it often carries the same news: sleep tends to slip when a teenager is worried, overloaded or on a phone late. If it has been poor for weeks, raise it with their doctor before it becomes an argument about bedtimes.
How do you feel on Sunday night about the week ahead?
Why ask it
Sunday night is when the coming week shows up, so the answer can be a truer reading of school than a report card. Dread about one named thing can be worked on. A general heaviness every single week deserves a slower conversation, not a pep talk.
What seems unfair to you at the moment?
Why ask it
Fairness is a subject teenagers will discuss readily, and anger often sits just behind it. Hear the whole case before you weigh in. Sometimes they are right, and saying so plainly earns you a hearing the next time they are not.
What do you like most about yourself?
Why ask it
Many teenagers find this harder than listing their faults, so allow a long pause and do not answer for them. If it stays stuck, ask what a good friend would say about them, which is easier to borrow. Whatever they name, agree with it and stop there.
What do you tell yourself when you get something wrong?
Why ask it
This reaches the inner voice without using the word self-esteem. Some teenagers move on and some run a commentary harsher than anything an adult would say to them. With the second kind, arguing with the voice rarely helps; asking whether they would say it to a friend sometimes does.
What pressure do you feel that nobody has ever said out loud?
Why ask it
Much of the pressure on a teenager is unspoken: what an older sibling did, what the family gave up, what everyone in their year appears to manage. Naming it is a good part of the relief. If some of it comes from you, say what you meant, and keep it short.
What is the hardest thing you are dealing with right now?
Why ask it
Not a first question: ask it once easier ones have gone well. If the answer is small, take it seriously anyway, because how you handle a small disclosure goes a long way to deciding whether you hear a large one.
Is there something you have stopped telling people because of how they reacted?
Why ask it
Asking about a closed door is easier to answer than asking for the secret behind it. The story tells you what an adult's bad reaction has already cost, and the adult in it may be you. If so, do not defend the reaction.
How can I tell when you want advice and when you just want me to listen?
Why ask it
Many adults guess, and guess advice. A teenager can usually name the signal, or will agree to say at the start which one they want. Then keep to the deal, above all the first time it is hard to.
Getting past small talk with a teenager
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
How to run the conversation
Work from easy to hard
The order on this page is deliberate: the groups run from Openers down to Feelings, and the first question in each group is an easy one. Nobody answers a question about fear from a standing start. It is far more likely after twenty minutes of being taken seriously about smaller things.
Space the questions out
Two or three in one sitting is plenty. Asking them in sequence turns a conversation into a questionnaire, and teenagers recognize the format immediately.
Follow the answer, not the list
If a question opens something up, stay there. The list exists to get you started, not to be completed.
Answer one yourself
Most of these work in both directions. Say which class dragged for you, what your first paycheck went on, which adult you would have gone to at their age. Keep it short and hand the conversation back: the aim is a trade, not your life story.
Which group for which moment
In the car, on a walk, doing the dishes
Openers and School suit any moment when you are side by side and doing something else. Not having to look at each other often makes it easier for a teenager to answer, and the task gives both of you a reason to let a silence run.
At the table with other people
Openers and Future work with an audience, and everyone at the table can answer them, adults included. Keep Friends, Family and Feelings for when it is just the two of you. Nobody describes a falling-out in front of a younger sibling.
One to one, with time
Friends, Family and Feelings need a setting where nobody is about to walk in and nothing has to happen next. Late evening is often when a teenager chooses to talk. If that is when it comes, the conversation is worth more than the bedtime.
In a classroom or youth group
Use Openers and Future, let people pass without a reason, and answer the question yourself first. Questions from Family and Feelings ask a teenager to disclose something in front of peers, so leave those for a private conversation.
The questions teens ask back
"What were you like at my age?"
The honest version is the useful one: what you worried about, what you were bad at, who your friends were. A polished account of working hard and behaving well ends the exchange.
"Did you ever get in trouble?"
Often this is a test of whether you will be straight with them. You can be truthful without the details that turn it into instructions: what happened, what it cost you, what you would do differently.
"Why do you care so much about my grades?"
Give the real reason, which for many parents is worry about their options and not the number itself. If it sounds more like your fear than their need once you say it out loud, admit that too.
"Would you pick the same job again?"
A question about their own future, asked sideways. Say what you like about your work, what you put up with, and what you did not know at seventeen. "I am not sure" is an acceptable answer.
"Why can't I, when everyone else is allowed to?"
Underneath it is usually a request to hear your reasoning. Give the actual reason for the rule, say what would have to be true for it to change, and skip the line about other people's families.
"Do you trust me?"
It tends to come straight after a no. Separate the two things out loud: you can trust them and still not trust a situation, a driver or a house with no adults in it. Then name one thing you trust them with now that you did not a year ago.
When they ask nothing
Some teenagers will not ask an adult anything for a long while, and that is not a sign the conversation failed. The last question in the Family group invites one directly. Save it until the easier questions have become ordinary between you.
Responding well
Listen without preparing a reply
Teenagers can tell the difference between being heard and being processed. If you are composing your response while they talk, they will notice and the answers will shorten.
Do not correct the belief
If you ask what they believe that their friends do not, and then argue with it, you have taught them not to answer honestly. Disagreement can wait for a different conversation.
Keep confidence unless there is danger
Honor what they tell you. The exception is safety: talk of self-harm, of not wanting to be here, or of someone hurting them should not stay between the two of you. Say out loud that you are going to get help, then contact their doctor, a school counselor or a crisis line that serves where you live the same day, and your local emergency number if the danger is immediate.
Return to it later
Referring back to something they told you a week ago is clear evidence you were listening. It can do more than the original conversation did.
Common mistakes
Treating a problem as small
Scale is not the point. A falling-out with a friend can be the most significant thing happening in someone's life, and ranking it against adult problems ends the discussion.
Comparing them to a sibling or to yourself
Both land as judgment no matter how they are phrased. If a comparison would really help, it belongs in a much later conversation, not this one.
Rapid-fire questions
Several questions in a row feels like being investigated. One question, a long pause and a real follow-up gets more than ten questions in a row.
Asking for information you already have
If you have seen the grade or read the message, asking about it as though you have not is a quick way to lose credibility. Say what you know and ask about the part you do not.