TAG QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH: LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ****************** BÙI THỊ NGỌC TUYỀN TAG QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH: LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS Câu hỏi tách biệt trong tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60 22 02 01 HANOI- 2014 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES ****************** BÙI THỊ NGỌC TUYỀN TAG QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH: LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS Câu hỏi tách biệt trong tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English Linguistics Code: 60 22 02 01 Supervisor: Assoc. Prof. Dr. Võ Đại Quang HANOI- 2014 i CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY I, the undersigned, hereby certify my authority of the study project report entitled TAG QUESTIONS IN ENGLISH: LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS ( Câu hỏi tách biệt trong Tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu) submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MA in English Linguistics. Except where the reference is indicated, no other person‟s work has been used without due acknowledgement in the text of the thesis. Hanoi, 2014 Bùi Thị Ngọc Tuyền ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This thesis could not have been completed without the help and support from a number of people. First and foremost, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Assoc. Prof. Dr. Võ Đại Quang, my supervisor, who has patiently and constantly supported me through the stages of the study, and whose stimulating ideas, expertise, and suggestions have inspired me greatly through my growth as an academic researcher. I am grateful to the lecturers of M.A course for their valuable lectures from which I have had such a great motivation and benefited a lot in writing this thesis. My sincere thanks also go to all my colleagues and students at Tran Phu High School for their assistance during the process of collecting data for my research work. Last but not least, special words of thanks are sent to my beloved family for their encouragement and their sacrifice they have devoted to the fulfilment of this academic work. iii ABSTRACT Tag question is a special type of questions in English, which is frequently used by native speakers in daily conversations. However, students at Tran Phu High School, Quang Ninh Province usually make mistakes in using this grammatical structure so they cannot communicate successfully. This thesis is an attempt to help students master the nature of tag questions and become more confident in using them. In this thesis, the following points have been raised: the most relevant factors involving a tag question such as notions of tag questions, polarity, operators, intonation. Syntactic and semantic features of tag questions are also clearly presented. Besides, a study on students‟ mistakes in using tag questions is provided. The data were collected among 90 eleventh grade students at Tran Phu high school by means of questionnaires. The findings highlighted students‟ categories of mistakes including structural mistakes and intonation-related mistakes. Through the findings, the author has also tried to find out the causes of the mistakes and suggests some possible solutions in order to help students avoid committing these types of mistakes. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Certificate of originality i Acknowledgements ii Abstract iii Table of contents iv List of tables vii PART A: INTRODUCTION 1 1. Rationale of the study 1 2. Aims of the study 1 3. Objectives of the study 2 4. Research questions 2 5. Scope of the study 2 6. Significance of the study 2 7. Design of the study 3 PART B: DEVELOPMENT 4 Chapter 1 : LITERATURE REVIEW 4 1.1. Review of previous works related to the theme of this research 4 1.2. Review of theoretical background 5 1.2.1. English questions 5 1.2.1.1. Definition of questions 5 1.2.1.2. Classification of English questions 6 1.2.1.3. Definitions of English tag questions 7 1.2.2. Operators 7 1.2.2.1. Operators for Negation 8 1.2.2.2. Operators for Interrogation 9 1.2.2.3. Operators for Emphasis 9 1.2.3. Polarity 10 1.2.3.1. Definition of polarity 10 1.2.3.2. Polarity in tag questions 11 1.2.3.2.1. Opposite Polarity Tag Questions 11 1.2.3.2.2. Same Polarity Tag Questions 13 v 1.2.4. Intonation 14 1.2.4.1. Definition of intonation 14 1.2.4.2. Types of English intonation 15 1.2.4.2.1. The falling tune ( The Glide- down) 15 1.2.4.2.2. The first rising tune ( The Glide-up) 16 1.2.4.2.3. The second rising tune ( The Take –off) 17 1.2.4.2.4. The falling- rising tune (The Dive) 17 1.2.4.3. Functions of intonation 18 1.2.4.3.1. Attitudinal function 18 1.2.4.3.2. Accentual function 18 1.2.4.3.3. Grammatical function 19 1.2.4.3.4. Discourse function 19 1.3. Summary 19 Chapter 2: METHODOLOGY 20 2.1. Research-governing orientations 20 2.1.1 Research questions revisited 20 2.1.2. Research setting 20 2.2. Research methods 21 2.2.1. Participants of the research 21 2.2.2. Research Instrument – Questionnaire 21 2.2.2.1.Principles for questionnaire formulation 21 2.2.2.2. Structure and purposes of questionnaire 21 2.2.3. Data collection procedures 22 2.2.4. Data analysis techniques 23 2.3. Summary 23 Chapter 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSIONS 24 3.1. The linguistic features of tag questions 24 3.1.1. Syntactic features of tag questions. 24 3.1.2. Semantic features of tag questions 25 3.1.3. Other types of tags 26 3.1.3.1. Tags with imperatives 27 3.1.3.2. Tags with exclamative sentences 27 vi 3.1.3.3. Echo tags 28 3.1.3.4. Invariant tags 28 3.2. Common mistakes made by students when using tag questions. 29 3.2.1 Structural mistakes 30 3.2.1.1. Wrong use of operators 31 3.2.1.2. Wrong use of pronouns 31 3.2.1.3. Wrong use of polarity 31 3.2.2. Intonation-related mistakes 32 3.2.3. Other mistakes 33 3.3. The causes of students‟ mistakes in using tag questions 34 3.3.1. Teaching methods and learning materials 34 3.3.2. Students‟ poor competence and performance 34 3.4. Solutions to the problems 35 3.4.1. Solutions for teachers 35 3.4.2. Solutions for students 35 3.5. Pedagogical implications in teaching tag questions 36 3.6. Summary 38 PART C – CONCLUSION 39 1. Recapitulation 39 2. Conclusions 39 3. Limitations and suggestion for further study 41 REFERENCES 42 BIBLIOGRAPHY 44 APPENDIX I vii LIST OF TABLES Table 1: The number and percentage of each category of mistakes Table 2: Number and percentage of structural mistakes Table 3: Number and percentage of intonation- related mistakes 1 PART A: INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study Tag question in English is a special type of questions which frequently appear in daily conversations by native speakers. Tag questions have a complex structure and diversity of meaning. During the time of teaching English at Tran Phu High School, I have had a hard time correcting students‟ errors and mistakes. Most of these common errors and mistakes center round linguistic features of this question type. Moreover, I find that most of the students get confused when answering a tag question. They can answer the question, for instance, “Do you live near here?” without any difficulties. Nevertheless, it is not easy for them to answer such questions as “You live near here, don‟t you?” or “ You don‟t live near here, do you?” Also, in many situations during English lessons, I receive the same answer for one tag question which is said with different patterns of tunes (rising or falling). Obviously, my students are unaware of the role of intonation in functions of tag questions. These students‟ errors and mistakes in using tag questions have, therefore, urged me to choose this topic as the theme for my M.A. thesis in English language. I hope that this research -Tag questions in English: linguistic features and possible pedagogical implications- can serve as a contribution to teaching and learning English. Suggestions and pedagogical implications of this study can be utilized to aid teachers and students in the process of instruction as well as learning a second language. 2. Aims of the study This thesis is an attempt to help learners of English in general and students at Tran Phu high school in particular gain an insight into tag questions in English, and on this basis, improvement can be made in using English tag questions. [...]... will be presented in this field of study I would like to devote all my interest in the linguistic features of tag questions in English (both canonical and invariant type) Then I would like to investigate the kinds of mistakes in using tag questions the students at Tran Phu High School often make Basing on the findings, the author can suggest some possible pedagogical implications in order to help the... are linguistic features of tag questions and common errors and mistakes made by students Moreover, basing on the findings, the author will discuss the causes of mistakes and propose some possible solutions to the problems encountered 3.1 Linguistic features of tag questions In terms of formal properties, canonical English tag questions are sensitive to three main factors: the choice of operator and. .. examine the linguistic features of tag questions in English in detail ii expose some common mistakes made by the 11th grade students at Tran Phu High School iii present some possible solutions to the problems encountered by teachers and students in teaching and learning tag questions 4 Research questions The objectives of the study can be elaborated into these research questions: i What are the linguistic. .. seek students‟ attitude towards intonation in tag questions, how they know about different purposes of tag questions when pronounced with different intonations and how to answer tag question correctly In general, those questions in the questionnaire are designed with the aim to find out the mistakes in using tag questions in English in terms of structure, intonation and functions 22 2.2.2 Data collection... syntactic, semantic and pragmatic features of tag questions as a small part in the whole MA thesis And Dao Thi Tam (2007) paid her attention to various patterns of intonation used in English tag questions and their equivalents in Vietnamese These works have brought about an overview of tag questions in English Generally, they presented linguistic features of tag questions – their structure and their functions... and rising tone (including falling-rising) to indicate “shared” of “given” information People also use intonation to indicate to others that they have finished speaking and that another person is expected to speak 1.3 Summary In this chapter, the author has presented concepts of tag questions, operators, polarity in tag questions, intonation, types of intonations and functions of intonations This theory... following questions: 1 What are the linguistic features of the English tag questions? 2 What categories of mistakes do students at Tran Phu High School often make in using tag questions? 3 What should be done to help improve the students' skill in using and understanding English tag questions? 2.1.2 Research setting The study was conducted at Tran Phu High School, where English is the compulsory and. .. negative tag 11 d He doesn‟t like to do that, does he? negative stem, positive tag ( Ron Cowan: 2008) Tag questions such as (3a) and (3b), in which the tag starts out in the high pitch range and rises at the end, signal that the asker is not completely sure of the answer and is seeking information In contrast, tag questions such as (3c) and (3d), in which the pitch on the tag starts high and then falls,... this idea when he pointed out that “intonation does in fact have both a linguistic and paralinguistic dimension” (Paul Tench, 1996:2) The linguistic dimension here concerns the message itself: How many pieces of information there are; whether the speaker is telling you something or asking you, or whether the speaker is turning to a new topic or finishing off an old one Whereas, paralinguistic dimension... What are the linguistic features of English tag questions? ii What categories of mistakes do the students at Tran Phu high school often make in using tag questions? iii What should be done to help improve the students' skill in using and understanding English tag questions? 5 Scope of the study The study is focused on English tag questions in terms of structural and semantic features Another focus of . LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS Câu hỏi tách biệt trong tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English. LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS Câu hỏi tách biệt trong tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field: English. LINGUISTIC FEATURES AND POSSIBLE PEDAGOGICAL IMPLICATIONS ( Câu hỏi tách biệt trong Tiếng Anh: Đặc điểm ngôn ngữ học và các ứng dụng sư phạm khả hữu) submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements