These sentence examples are too confusing

MaggiC1Kwiziq community member

These sentence examples are too confusing

Let's see -at what moment in time?- you find a good job!


Let's see - at the time that- you find a good job!


As you can see both options work in this context, and I can use lots of examples like this but to understand the difference we need sentences which cannot work as both options

Asked 3 years ago
ClaraC1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor

Hi Maggie, 

I've also struggled with the cuando/cuándo but I do think Inma's explanation, which I'm including here, really helps to grasp the differences:

This sentence is an indirect interrogative sentence. Even though it is an indirect one it is still needs the accent as an interrogative adverb. You can still make the sentence with "in what location" and although it doesn't sound as well as using "when" it'd be grammatically correct. 

A ver cuándo (en qué momento) encuentras un buen trabajo.

Let´s see when ( in what moment/at what point in time) you find a good job. 

You can still see that it has the form of a question (indirectly)

However here is another example with cuando with no accent, as a relative adverb (not interrogative):

Ella estaba en casa cuando (en el momento en que) agredieron a su novio.

She was at home when (the moment in which) her boyfriend was attacked.

Here, I can't use "in what moment/at what point in time" because it wouldn't make sense:

She was at home in what moment in time ??? her boyfriend was attacked.

It wouldn't be grammatically correct. 

I hope this helped.

Inma

DeborahC1Kwiziq community member
Hola,

I keep having the same problem. See another example here:

Dime cuándo/cuando vas a salir.

Tell me when (at which exact time / in the moment) you are leaving.

It seems like both work in English depending on what you want to express. This is very frustrating when solving the tests because I cannot know which meaning you were thinking of when designing the tests. So I suggest that either both cuando and cuándo should be correct in these sentences or you specify in the hint to the questions which one you are expecting.

Thanks so much,

Deborah

These sentence examples are too confusing

Let's see -at what moment in time?- you find a good job!


Let's see - at the time that- you find a good job!


As you can see both options work in this context, and I can use lots of examples like this but to understand the difference we need sentences which cannot work as both options

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