Dean Holdsworth, England
Give each student 4 or five cards, each with a question tag written in bold on them. Put the students into groups and give them a few topics to discuss: politics, football etc and tell the students that the secondary aim of the task is to get rid of the cards during the discussion i.e. Madrid got Beckham for a steal, didn't they? That hutton inquiry is going on a bit, isn't it?

It's important to monitor for the correct intonation patterns throughout the task.At the end gather all the cards in and have a little feedback and consolidation session.
Making statements about famous people or each other.'You're from Korea,
aren't you?' and so on. 

Gavin McDougall, Canada
Two major functions which question tags often fulfil are either that of expressing doubt or of inviting a response, so if we can create situations which call for either of these, we should be able to generate some valid practice. Here are a few ideas that you might try out:

The teacher stands outside the class with a bag and learners file out one at a time to contribute a personal effect to the bag; a pencil, rubber, watch, etc. These are then redistributed so each learner has an object that is not their own. Learners stand up and mingle to locate the owner of the object they are holding, saying things such as "I know you don't smoke, so this lighter isn't yours, is it?" or "There are a few people with long hair- this isn't your hair tie, is it?".

For newly formed classes, the personal possession might be their actual names. Learners receive a list of class members' names and mingle to tick each name off the list, saying "Your name isn't Javier, is it?" or "Your name is Mohammed, isn't it?". The teacher monitors closely, observing whether the intonation reflects the level of certainty as indicated by the body language and facial expressions. For a newly formed class, the intonation should typically rise for most questions at the beginning of the activity when there are many names to choose from. Towards the end, when the list of names yet to be ticked is growing small, more of the questions should demonstrate falling intonation.

Well-bonded classes will know each other's first names, but not always their surnames, so in this instance you might consider a variation wherein the list of names consists of first initial and surname (e.g. G. Chong). If the class is fairly mono-cultural it may be that some learners share a surname, providing the doubt that will call for rising intonation. Similarly, some first initials may be repeated in the list. If neither of these situations are the case, this activity will only generate falling intonation tags for learners who employ their powers of deductions.

The next activity highlights the function of inviting a response while practising use of the correct auxiliary. It has one learner being grilled with questions for one minute and trying to avoid the answers 'Yes' and 'No'. (More difficult than you might think!). Similar expressions such as 'Yeah' and 'Uh-uh' must also be avoided. When the minute is up or if the person does use one of these expressions, it is another's turn to be questioned. e.g.

A: Your name's Jana, isn't it?
B: It's true.
A: You study at the British Council, don't you?
B: Every Tuesday and Thursday.
A: You said 'yes', didn't you?
B: No, I didn't!

In this example B has used the word "No" before the minute was up and has therefore been unsuccessful. The interrogator continues asking questions until someone lasts a minute, at which point that person then becomes the interrogator, with the aim of remaining the interrogator as long as possible, and another assumes the hotseat. Playing the game in threesomes allows one person to be the judge while maximising the student talking time. Regardless of what size of groups you choose for this activity, it should be clearly demonstrated first in front of the whole class.

Perhaps the interrogation theme might also be exploited as a role play of detective (interrogator) and two suspects trying to convince the detective of their alibis. The two suspects receive role cards which detail their individual movements on the night in question but which do not corroborate on certain points. Each will need to lie once, and is allowed to do so only once, in order for their stories to tally, but it is not clear when looking at just one role card which two crucial facts will reveal them as guilty. After they have all read the roles individually, the interrogation begins. Possible use of the target language might be "We were in the pub together, weren't we Franz?", "He told you we were together in the pub, didn't he?". The detectives, who slowly uncover inconsistencies, produce target language such as "So you both were in the pub at 8:00, were you? Well, you weren't there at 8:30, were you? Because you Maria said you were at the restaurant by that time, didn't you?"

An activity which integrates listening would be for the learners to listen or watch a narrative story then recount parts of it to each other. If either the plot or the language used is sufficiently complicated, the learners' doubt will give them the opportunity to use rising tags as well as falling ones. A more controlled variation would be to provide cards, each containing one of the various tags, which are dealt out or turned over one by one. Learners incorporate the tags they receive into statements about the narrative.

A final idea that could have several variations involves the use of general knowledge trivia. The teacher prepares two lists of trivia statements, some of which are true and some of which are false. List A has the answers for list B and vice versa. One pair of students receives list A and a second pair receive list B. Each pair first works alone to put the statements into three columns: Statements we are sure are true, statements we are sure are false, and statements we are not sure about.

When this is accomplished, the two pairs compete against each other in a quiz. They take turns to read their statements as tag questions, with the choice of tag (positive or negative) indicating if the pair think the statement is true or false and their intonation indicating if they are sure or unsure about their answers. If Team A correctly identifies a statement as either true or false (through falling intonation and an appropriately positive or negative tag), they get one point. If they are incorrect about a statement (e.g. it is false when they indicate it is true), they lose a point. If they are unsure about a fact and read it out as a question tag with rising intonation, they neither gain nor lose a point. It is then the other team's turn to read out a statement. Score is kept and the team with the most points at the end is the winner.

e.g.
Team A: The Volga River is in Russia, isn't it? [Said with a negative tag, indicating that Team A think it is true, and said with falling intonation, indicating they feel sure and are willing to try to gain a point] Team B: Yes, it is. [Team A scores a point and it becomes Team B's turn.] Team B: Neil Young wasn't the first man to walk on the moon, was he? [Said with falling intonation, indicating they feel sure and are willing to try to gain a point, and said with a positive tag, indicating that Team A think it is false] Team A: No, he wasn't. Neil Armstrong was. [Team B scores a point. The teacher can also encourage students to use emphatic stress at this point- Armstrong.] Team B: The Nile River originates in Tanzania, doesn't it? [Said with rising intonation, indicating that they are unsure whether this is true or not and therefore do not wish risk a point.] Team A: Yes, it does. [The turn passes as normal to Team B, with no change in score.] Team B: Sydney is the capital of Australia, isn't it? [Said with a negative tag, indicating that Team A think it is true, and said with falling intonation, indicating they feel sure and are willing to try to gain a point] Team A: No, it isn't. Canberra is. [Team B loses a point.]

The instructions for the activity as I have described it are somewhat complicated, so it will again require a clear demonstration in front of the whole class followed by concept-checking questions at each stage. If you feel it might be too complicated for a particular class, consider principles such as information-gap (how it is created and how it is resolved), collaboration & competition (how and for what purpose), and the various student interaction patterns. Thinking about these principles should hopefully allow you to exploit the theme of trivia to produce your own variation which is suitable for a particular class. But perhaps that should be the subject of another letter. Best regards.

Barney Day, Japan
A few ideas to get students using tags:
(1) Job interview. The interviewee is given a job advert with some job information on it (such as job location, salary, requirements) and the interviewer has the applicant's C.V. They then use these to try to elicit extra information from the other person:

Applicant: I don't need a doctorate for this job, do I?
Interviewer: No, not as long as you have the relevant experience and a bachelor's degree. You do have a bachelor's degree, don't you?
Applicant: Yes, I studied Japanese and Russian at Leeds University... etc.

This can also be done with other situations using written prompts - classified ads (eg. for sale, personal ads as well as jobs).

(2) The clairvoyant: You're a Pisces, aren't you?
Baffled customer: Yes, I am. How did you know?
Clairvoyant: You have it tattooed on your arm. You're very quick to trust people aren't you? ...and so on.

(3) Sharing opinions. "Have you seen Titanic?"
"Yeah, it's rubbish, isn't it?*
"Mmmm, far too long in my opinion."

Personally when teaching tags I try to focus students on responses - when they realise that "Yes, I do" and "No, I don't" are not what the other person was looking for they start to recognise how useful tags can be. Hope this helps you!

John Chis, Romania
It isn't very difficult to teach your students to use Tag Questions if
you use Tags while talking to them! So start use Tag Questions in your
daily communication and they will use them too!