Question tags

• Engels
• MBO
• Studiejaar 1,3

Question tags

What is it?

Question tags are interrogative (vragende) sentences that appear at the end of the sentence to act as confirmation (bevestiging)

Een question tag, is een korte vraag, waarmee je om bevestiging vraagt.

  

- She works as a SIO, doesn't she?

- They are available 24/7, aren't they?

1. Affirmative Sentences (bevestigend)

Ramesh is intelligent, isn’t he?

You are running for election, aren’t you?

He lived in Delhi, didn’t he?

When to use do/did/does

1. In the present tense, do takes the form do or does, depending on the subject:

Subject: Verb:

I/you/we/they     --->  Do

He/she/it    --->  Does

2: In the simple past tense, the base verb do takes the form did with all subjects:

Subject: 

I/you/we/they  ---> Did

He/she/it            ---> Did

2. Exclamatory Sentences (uitroeptekens)

Bravo! You won, didn’t you?

Alas! She didn’t get that job, did she?

Hurray! He came first in the race, didn’t he?

3. Imperative Sentences (gebiedende wijs)

De gebiedende wijs is een werkwoordsvorm waarmee je iemand direct aanspreekt, bijvoorbeeld: Kom hier! Je gebruikt de gebiedende wijs als je een bevel geeft of een wens uitspreekt. Je schrijft dan alleen de stam van het werkwoord. Een zin met een gebiedende wijs heeft geen onderwerp

Come here, won’t you?

Please close the door, will you?

Go to the doctor, won’t you?

Question tags rules:

Rule1: 

When question tags are negative, verbs are used in an abbreviated (verkort) form. 

For example: 

don’t, shouldn’t, couldn’t, daren’t, hadn’t, won’t they, etc

Rule 2: If the sentence is positive, the question tag will be negative and vice-versa. Question tags should be written after the end of the statement with a comma. 

The structure is as follows: 

helping verb+ Subject? 

Or 

helping verb n’t+ Subject?

Rule 3: Pronouns are used with question tags, and nouns are not used. For example:

Ram is going to Delhi, isn’t he?

You are studying, aren’t you?

Rule 4: In case "helping verbs" are missing from the sentence, do/does/did are used in the question tags. For example:

He eats vegetables, doesn’t he?

They run fast, don’t they?

Rule 5: If a sentence contains there, this, that, those, these in Subject (OW), then the question tag’s subject would be according to reported speech rules. For example:

There is a bird, isn’t there?

That is his car, isn’t it?

That is my pen, isn’t it?

No more questions?

Take a look at your hand-out and finish the exercises.