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Study skills

Look at the following sentence:

• It is interesting to watch them, isn’t it?

If we remove the last two words, it becomes a statement.
• It is interesting to watch them.

Thus, by adding the last two words, the sentence has become a question. These two words

together are known as a question tag.
A question tag is a grammatical structure in which an assertive or an imperative sentence is

turned into interrogative by adding the tag.

For example :
• The earth is round.

The earth is round, isn’t it?

Question tags are formed with the auxiliary or modal verb from the statement and the
appropriate subject.

Some rules to remember:

1. An affirmative sentence is followed by a negative question tag.

• You are hungry, aren’t you?
• This is Jimmy’s bag, isn’t it?

2. A negative sentence is followed by a positive question tag.

• The teacher is not angry, is she?

• It is not raining, is it?

3. When the verb in the main sentence is in the simple present we form the question tag with
do / does.

• Geeta likes gardening, doesn’t she?

• You know the national anthem, don’t you?
4. If the verb is in the simple past we use did.

• They gave you their phone number, didn’t they?

• You invited them to dinner, didn’t you?

5. When a sentence has the auxiliary verb, the question tag will be formed from the
auxiliary verb:

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