Learning to Use Question Tags Effectively

Students of Class X and XII are busy preparing for their public examinations. Question tags (American), also called tag questions (British), is one of the sections on grammar students need to know in order to score good marks in English exams. As requested by some students, this column and the next few columns will focus on grammar. A week ago, TH Lawrence, an English language trainer and author of three grammar books, brought a grammatically incorrect sentence in a newspaper column to my notice and asked me to comment on it. In one of our regional dailies today I saw the following dialogue under ‘Grammar and Usage’ as an example illustrated by a school teacher to help students who are going to take their ensuing SSLC examination:

• Mother: You look agitated, don’t you?

Father: Of course, I’m.

The short answer should be: Of course, I do. Yes, author Lawrence is correct. The main verb in the sentence “You look agitated” is “look” and therefore the tag question is “don’t you?” Therefore, the answer should be “…. I do”.

Tags are short questions that we use at the end of a statement. It is good to know when to use tags. Tags are used mainly in spoken English and not in written English. If the intonation (musical pitch of our voice) of the tag is falling, then the speaker is asking for confirmation of the statement they made and if the intonation is rising, then the speaker is in fact asking a question. Look at these examples:

•  You can’t complete it before 10 pm today, can you? (rising tone and so it is a question)
•  You will accompany me to the hospital, will you? (falling tone and so asking for confirmation)

Tags are made based on certain rules. If there is an auxiliary in a sentence, the tag is used with an auxiliary as in the examples below:

•  He is an intelligent person, isn’t he?
•  They are highly motivated students, aren’t they?
•  She can do it, can’t she?

If there is no auxiliary in a sentence, we use do/don’t, does/doesn’t, or did/didn’t depending on the tense of the main verb in the sentence. If the sentence is positive, the tag is negative and if the sentence is negative, the tag is positive.

•  You know him, don’t you?
•  You don’t know him, do you?
•  Sheela knows the answer, doesn’t she?
•  Sheela doesn’t know the answer, does she?
•  John submitted the assignment yesterday, didn’t he?
•  John didn’t submit the assignment, did he?

Statements with am, may, ought to and let us may cause problems to learners of English as they do not follow the normal pattern. Look at the examples below:

•  I’m quite angry with her, aren’t I?
•  My mom may attend the meeting, mightn’t she?
•  You ought to meet her now, shouldn’t you?
•  Let’s meet at 10 o’clock tomorrow, shall we?

In the second part of the article that will appear next week, I’ll discuss the other three types of tag: statement tags, directive tags and exclamation tags.

rayanal@yahoo.co.uk

is an ELT Resource Person and Professor of English