IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 36 with Answer

READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
The dugong: Sea cow
Dugongs are herbivorous mammals that spend their entire lives in the sea. Their close
relatives the manatees also venture into or live in freshwater. Together dugongs and
manatees make up the order Sirenia or sea cows, so-named because dugongs and
manatees are thought to have given rise to the myth of the mermaids or sirens of the sea.
A
The dugong, which is a large marine mammal which, together with the manatees, looks
rather like a cross between a rotund dolphin and a walrus. Its body, flippers and fluke
resemble those of a dolphin but it has no dorsal fin. Its head looks somewhat like that of a
walrus without the long tusks.
B
Dugongs, along with other Sirenians whose diet consists mainly of sea-grass; and the
distribution of dugongs very closely follows that of these marine flowering plants. As
seagrasses grow rooted in the sediment, they are limited by the availability of light.
Consequently they are found predominantly in shallow coastal waters, and so too are
dugongs. But, this is not the whole story. Dugongs do not eat all species of seagrass,
preferring seagrass of higher nitrogen and lower fibre content.
C
Due to their poor eyesight, dugongs often use smell to locate edible plants. They also have
a strong tactile sense, and feel their surroundings with their long sensitive bristles. They will
dig up an entire plant and then shake it to remove the sand before eating it. They have been
known to collect a pile of plants in one area before eating them. The flexible and muscular
upper lip is used to dig out the plants. When eating they ingest the whole plant, including the
roots, although when this is impossible they will feed on just the leaves. A wide variety of
seagrass has been found in dugong stomach contents, and evidence exists they will eat
algae when seagrass is scarce. Although almost completely herbivorous, they will
occasionally eat invertebrates such as jellyfish, sea squirts, and shellfish.
D
A heavily grazed seagrass bed looks like a lawn mown by a drunk. Dugongs graze
apparently at random within a seagrass bed, their trails meandering in all directions across
the bottom. This is rather an inefficient means of removing seagrass that results in
numerous small tufts remaining. And this is where the dugongs derive some advantage from
their inefficiency. The species that recover most quickly from this disturbance, spreading out
vegetatively from the remaining tufts, are those that dugongs like to eat. In addition, the new
growth found in these areas tends to be exactly what hungry dugongs like.
E
Dugongs are semi-nomadic, often travelling long distances in search of food, but staying
within a certain range their entire life. Large numbers often move together from one area to
another. It is thought that these movements are caused by changes in seagrass availability.
Their memory allows them to return to specific points after long travels. Dugong movements
mostly occur within a localised area of seagrass beds, and animals in the same region show
individualistic patterns of movement.
F
Recorded numbers of dugongs are generally believed to be lower than actual numbers, due
to a lack of accurate surveys. Despite this, the dugong population is thought to be shrinking,
with a worldwide decline of 20 per cent in the last 90 years. They have disappeared from the
waters of Hong Kong, Mauritius, and Taiwan, as well as parts of Cambodia, Japan, the
Philippines and Vietnam. Further disappearances are likely. (In the late 1960s, herds of up
to 500 dugongs were observed off the coast of East Africa and nearby islands. However,
current populations in this area are extremely small, numbering 50 and below, and it is
thought likely they will become extinct. The eastern side of the Red Sea is the home of large
populations numbering in the hundreds, and similar populations are thought to exist on the
western side. In the 1980s, it was estimated there could be as many as 4,000 dugongs in
the Red Sea. The Persian Gulf has the second-largest dugong population in the world,
inhabiting most of the southern coast, and the current population is believed to be around
7,500. Australia is home to the largest population, stretching from Shark Bay in Western
Australia to Moreton Bay in Queensland. The population of Shark Bay is thought to be
stable with over 10,000 dugongs.)
G
Experience from various parts of northern Australia suggests that Extreme weather such as
cyclones and floods can destroy hundreds of square kilometres of seagrass meadows, as
well as washing dugongs ashore. The recovery of seagrass meadows and the spread of
seagrass into new areas, or areas where it has been destroyed, can take over a decade.
For example, about 900 km2 of seagrass was lost in Hervey Bay in 1992, probably because
of murky water from flooding of local rivers, and run-off turbulence from a cyclone three
weeks later. Such events can cause extensive damage to seagrass communities through
severe wave action, shifting sand and reduction in saltiness and light levels. Prior to the
1992 floods, the extensive seagrasses in Hervey Bay supported an estimated 1750
dugongs. Eight months after the floods the affected area was estimated to support only
about 70 dugongs. Most animals presumably survived by moving to neighbouring areas.
However, many died attempting to move to greener pastures, with emaciated carcasses
washing up on beaches up to 900km away.
H
If dugongs do not get enough to eat they may calve later and produce fewer young. Food
shortages can be caused by many factors, such as a loss of habitat, death and decline in
quality of seagrass, and a disturbance of feeding caused by human activity. Sewage,
detergents, heavy metal, hypersaline water, herbicides, and other waste products all
negatively affect seagrass meadows. Human activity such as mining, trawling, dredging,
land-reclamation, and boat propeller scarring also cause an increase in sedimentation which
smothers seagrass and prevents light from reaching it. This is the most significant negative
factor affecting seagrass. One of the dugong’s preferred species of seagrass, Halophila
ovalis, declines rapidly due to lack of light, dying completely after 30 days.
I
Despite being legally protected in many countries, the main causes of population decline
remain anthropogenic and include hunting, habitat degradation, and fishing-related fatalities.
Entanglement in fishing nets has caused many deaths, although there are no precise
statistics. Most issues with industrial fishing occur in deeper waters where dugong
populations are low, with local fishing being the main risk in shallower waters. As dugongs
cannot stay As dugongs cannot stay underwater for a very long period, they are highly
prone to deaths due to entanglement. The use of shark nets has historically caused large
numbers of deaths, and they have been eliminated in most areas and replaced with baited
hooks. Hunting has historically been a problem too, although in most areas they are no
longer hunted, with the exception of certain indigenous communities. In areas such as
northern Australia, hunting remains the greatest impact on the dugong population
Questions 1-4
Summary
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE
THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet.
Dugongs are herbivorous mammals that spend their entire lives in the sea. Yet Dugongs are
picky on their feeding Seagrass, and only chose seagrass with higher 1_________ and
lower fibre. To compensate for their poor eyesight, they use their 2 _________ to feel their
surroundings.
It is like Dugongs are “farming” seagrass. They often leave 3 _________ randomly in all
directions across the sea bed. Dugongs prefer eating the newly grew seagrass recovering
from the tiny 4 _________ left behind by the grazing dugongs.
Questions 5-9
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 5-9 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is True
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN If the information is not given in the passage
5 The dugong will keep eating up the plant completely when they begin to feed.
6 It takes more than ten years for the re-growth of seagrass where it has been grazed by
Dugongs.
7 Even in facing food shortages, the strong individuals will not compete with the weak
small ones for food.
8 It is thought that the dugong rarely returns to the old habitats when they finished the
plant.
9 Coastal industrial fishing poses the greatest danger to dugongs which are prone to be
killed due to entanglement.
Questions 10-13
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each
answer.
10 What is Dugong in resemblance to yet as people can easily tell them apart from the
manatees by its tail?
11 What is the major reason Dugongs traveled long distances in herds from one place to
another?
12 What number, has estimated to be, of dugong’s population before the 1992 floods in
Hervey Bay took place?
13 What is thought to be the lethal danger when dugongs were often trapped in?

READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
 Thomas Young
The Last True Know-It-All
Thomas Young (1773-1829) contributed 63 articles to the Encyclopedia Britannica, including
46 biographical entries (mostly on scientists and classicists) and substantial essays on
“Bridge,” “Chromatics,” “Egypt,” “Languages” and “Tides”. Was someone who could write
authoritatively about so many subjects a polymath, a genius or a dilettante? In an ambitious
new biography, Andrew Robinson argues that Young is a good contender for the epitaph
“the last man who knew everything.” Young has competition, however: The phrase, which
Robinson takes for his title, also serves as the subtitle of two other recent biographies:
Leonard Warren’s 1998 life of paleontologist Joseph Leidy (1823-1891) and Paula Findlen’s
2004 book on Athanasius Kircher (1602-1680), another polymath.
Young, of course, did more than write encyclopedia entries. He presented his first paper to
the Royal Society of London at the age of 20 and was elected a Fellow a week after his 21st
birthday. In the paper, Young explained the process of accommodation in the human eye —
on how the eye focuses properly on objects at varying distances. Young hypothesised that
this was achieved by changes in the shape of the lens. Young also theorised that light
traveled in waves and ho believed that, to account for the ability to see in color, there must
be three receptors in the eye corresponding to the three “principal colors” to which the retina
could respond: red, green, violet. All these hypotheses Were subsequently proved to be
correct.
Later in his life, when he was in his forties, Young was instrumental in cracking the code that
unlocked the unknown script on the Rosetta Stone, a tablet that was “found” in Egypt by the
Napoleonic army in 1799. The stone contains text in three alphabets: Greek, something
unrecognisable and Egyptian hieroglyphs. The unrecognisable script is now known as
demotic and, as Young deduced, is related directly to hieroglyphic. His initial work on this
appeared in his Britannica entry on Egypt. In another entry, he coined the term Indo-
European to describe the family of languages spoken throughout most of Europe and
northern India. These are the landmark achievements of a man who was a child prodigy and
who, unlike many remarkable children, did not disappear into oblivion as an adult.
Born in 1773 in Somerset in England, Young lived from an early age with his maternal
grandfather, eventually leaving to attend boarding school. He had devoured books from the
age of two, and through his own initiative he excelled at Latin, Greek, mathematics and
natural philosophy. After leaving school, he was greatly encouraged by his mother’s uncle,
Richard Brocklesby, a physician and Fellow of the Royal Society. Following Brocklesby’s
lead, Young decided to pursue a career in medicine. He studied in London, following the
medical circuit, and then moved on to more formal education in Edinburgh, Gottingen and
Cambridge. After completing his medical training at the University of Cambridge in 1808,
Young set up practice as a physician in London. He soon became a Fellow of the Royal
College of Physicians and a few years later was appointed physician at St. George’s
Hospital.
Young’s skill as a physician, however, did not equal his skill as a scholar of natural
philosophy or linguistics. Earlier, in 1801, he had been appointed to a professorship of
natural philosophy at the Royal Institution, where he delivered as many as 60 lectures in a
year. These were published in two volumes in 1807. In 1804 Young had become secretary
to the Royal Society, a post he would hold until his death. His opinions were sought on civic
and national matters, such as the introduction of gas lighting to London and methods of ship
construction. From 1819 he was superintendent of the Nautical Almanac and secretary to
the Board of Longitude. From 1824 to 1829 he was physician to and inspector of
calculations for the Palladian Insurance Company. Between 1816 and 1825 he contributed
his many and various entries to the Encyclopedia Britannica, and throughout his career he
authored numerous books, essays and papers.
Young is a perfect subject for a biography — perfect, but daunting. Few men contributed so
much to so many technical fields. Robinson’s aim is to introduce non-scientists to Young’s
work and life. He succeeds, providing clear expositions of the technical material (especially
that on optics and Egyptian hieroglyphs). Some readers of this book will, like Robinson, find
Young’s accomplishments impressive; others will see him as some historians have —as a
dilettante. Yet despite the rich material presented in this book, readers will not end up
knowing Young personally. We catch glimpses of a playful Young, doodling Greek and Latin
phrases in his notes on medical lectures and translating the verses that a young lady had
written on the walls of a summerhouse into Greek elegiacs. Young was introduced into elite
society, attended the theatre and learned to dance and play the flute. In addition, he was an
accomplished horseman. However, his personal life looks pale next to his vibrant career and
studies.
Young married Eliza Maxwell in 1804, and according to Robinson, “their marriage was a
happy one and she appreciated his work,” Almost all we know about her is that she
sustained her husband through some rancorous disputes about optics and that she worried
about money when his medical career was slow to take off. Very little evidence survives
about the complexities of Young’s relationships with his mother and father. Robinson does
not credit them, or anyone else, with shaping Young’s extraordinary mind. Despite the lack
of details concerning Young’s relationships, however, anyone interested in what it means to
be a genius should read this book.
Questions 14-20
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 14-20 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
14 ‘The last man who knew everything’ has also been claimed to other people.
15 All Young’s articles were published in Encyclopedia Britannica.
16 Like others, Young wasn’t so brilliant when growing up.
17 Young’s talent as a doctor surpassed his other skills.
18 Young’s advice was sought by people responsible for local and national issues.
19 Young took part in various social pastimes.
20 Young suffered from a disease in his later years.
Questions 21-26
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for
each answer.
21 How many life stories did Young write for the Encyclopedia Britannica?
22 What aspect of scientific research did Young focus on in his first academic paper?
23 What name did Young introduce to refer to a group of languages?
24 Who inspired Young to start his medical studies?
25 Where did Young get a teaching position?
26 What contribution did Young make to London?
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
The Pearl
A
Throughout history, pearls have held a unique presence within the wealthy and powerful.
For instance, the pearl was the favored gem of the wealthy during the Roman Empire. This
gift from the sea had been brought back from the orient by the Roman conquests. Roman
women wore pearls to bed so they could be reminded of their wealth immediately upon
waking up. Before jewelers learned to cut gems, the pearl was of greater value than the
diamond. In the Orient and Persia Empire, pearls were ground into powders to cure anything
from heart disease to epilepsy, with possible aphrodisiac uses as well Pearls were once
considered an exclusive privilege for royalty. A law in 1612 drawn up by the Duke of Saxony
prohibited the wearing of pearls by the nobility, professors, doctors or their wives in an effort
to further distinguish royal appearance. American Indians also used freshwater pearls from
the Mississippi River as decorations and jewelry.
B
There are essentially three types of pearls: natural, cultured and imitation. A natural pearl
(often called an Oriental pearl) forms when an irritant, such as a piece of sand, works its
way into a particular species of oyster, mussel, or clam. As a defense mechanism, the
mollusk secretes a fluid to coat the irritant. The layer upon layer of this coating is deposited
on the irritant until a lustrous pearl is formed.
C
The only difference between natural pearls and cultured pearls is that the irritant is a
surgically implanted bead or piece of shell called Mother of Pearl. Often, these shells are
ground oyster shells that are worth significant amounts of money in their own right as irritant
catalysts for quality pearls. The resulting core is, therefore, much larger than in a natural
pearl. Yet, as long as there are enough layers of nacre (the secreted fluid covering the
irritant) to result in a beautiful, gem-quality pearl, the size of the nucleus is of no
consequence to beauty or durability.
D
Pearls can come from either salt or freshwater sources. Typically, saltwater pearls tend to
be higher quality, although there are several types of freshwater pearls that are considered
high in quality as well. Freshwater pearls tend to be very irregular in shape, with a puffed
rice appearance the most prevalent. Nevertheless, it is each individual pearl’s merits that
determines value more than the source of the pearl. Saltwater pearl oysters are usually
cultivated in protected lagoons or volcanic atolls. However, most freshwater cultured pearls
sold today come from China. Cultured pearls are the response of the shell to a tissue
implant. A tiny piece of mantle tissue from a donor shell is transplanted into a recipient shell.
This graft will form a pearl sac and the tissue will precipitate calcium carbonate into this
pocket. There are a number of options for producing cultured pearls: use freshwater or
seawater shells, transplant the graft into the mantle or into the gonad, add a spherical bead
or do it non-beaded. The majority of saltwater cultured pearls are grown with beads.
E
Regardless of the method used to acquire a pearl, the process usually takes several years.
Mussels must reach a mature age, which can take up to 3 years, and then be implanted or
naturally receive an irritant. Once the irritant is in place, it can take up to another 3 years for
the pearl to reach its full size. Often, the irritant may be rejected, the pearl will be terrifically
misshapen, or the oyster may simply die from disease or countless other complications. By
the end of a 5 to 10-year cycle, only 50% of the oysters will have survived. And of the pearls
produced, only approximately 5% are of substantial quality for top jewelry makers. From the
outset, a pearl farmer can figure on spending over $100 for every oyster that is farmed, of
which many will produce nothing or die.
F
Imitation pearls are a different story altogether. In most cases, a glass bead is dipped into a
solution made from fish scales. This coating is thin and may eventually wear off. One can
usually tell an imitation by biting on it. Fake pearls glide across your teeth, while the layers
of nacre on real pearls feel gritty. The Island of Mallorca (in Spain) is known for its imitation
pearl industry. Quality natural pearls are very rare jewels. The actual value of a natural pearl
is determined in the same way as it would be for other “precious” gems. The valuation
factors include size, shape, color, quality of surface, orient, and luster. In general, cultured
pearls are less valuable than natural pearls, whereas imitation peals almost have no value.
One way that jewelers can determine whether a pearl is cultured or natural is to have a gem
lab perform an x-ray of the pearl If the x-ray reveals a nucleus, the pearl is likely a bead-
nucleated saltwater pearl. If no nucleus is present, but irregular and small dark inner spots
indicating a cavity are visible, combined with concentric rings of organic substance, the pearl
is likely a cultured freshwater. Cultured freshwater pearls can often be confused for natural
pearls which present as homogeneous pictures that continuously darken toward the surface
of the pearl. Natural pearls will often show larger cavities where organic matter has dried out
and decomposed. Although imitation pearls look the part, they do not have the same weight
or smoothness as real pearls, and their luster will also dim greatly. Among cultured pearls,
Akoya pearls from Japan are some of the most lustrous. A good quality necklace of 40
Akoya pearls measuring 7mm in diameter sells for about $1,500, while a super- high-quality
strand sells for about $4,500. Size, on the other hand, has to do with the age of the oyster
that created the pearl (the more mature oysters produce larger pearls) and the location in
which the pearl was cultured. The South Sea waters of Australia tend to produce the larger
pearls; probably because the water along the coastline is supplied with rich nutrients from
the ocean floor. Also, the type of mussel common to the area seems to possess a
predilection for producing comparatively large pearls.
G
Historically, the world’s best pearls came from the Persian Gulf, especially around what is
now Bahrain. The pearls of the Persian Gulf were naturally created and collected by breath-
hold divers. The secret to the special luster of Gulf pearls probably derived from the unique
mixture of sweet and saltwater around the island. Unfortunately, the natural pearl industry of
the Persian Gulf ended abruptly in the early 1930s with the discovery of large deposits of oil.
Those who once dove for pearls sought prosperity in the economic boom ushered in by the
oil industry. The water pollution resulting from spilled oil and indiscriminate over-fishing of
oysters essentially ruined the once pristine pearl-producing waters of the Gulf. Today, pearl
diving is practiced only as a hobby. Still, Bahrain remains one of the foremost trading
centers for high-quality pearls. In fact, cultured pearls are banned from the Bahrain pearl
market, in an effort to preserve the location’s heritage. Nowadays, the largest stock of
natural pearls probably resides in India. Ironically, much of India’s stock of natural pearls
came originally from Bahrain. Unlike Bahrain, which has essentially lost its pearl resource,
traditional pearl fishing is still practiced on a small scale in India.
Questions 27-30
Reading Passage 3 has seven paragraphs, A-G.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter A-G in boxes 27-30 on your answer sheet.
27 ancient stories around the pearl and customers
28 Difficulties in the cultivating process.
29 Factors can decide the value of natural pearls.
30 Different growth mechanisms that distinguish the cultured pearls from natural ones.
Questions 31-36
Complete the summary below
Choose a letter from A-K for each answer.
Write them in boxes 31-36 on your answer sheet.
In ancient history, pearls have great importance within the rich and rulers, which was treated
as a gem for women in 31 _______ pearls were even used as medicine and sex drug for
people in 32 _______. There are essentially three types of pearls: natural, cultured and
imitation. Most freshwater cultured pearls sold today come from China while
the 33 _______ is famous for its imitation pearl industry. The country 34 _______. Usually
manufactures some of the glitteriest cultured ones while the nation such as 35 _______
produces the larger sized pearl due to the favorable environment along the coastline. In the
past, one country of 36 _______ in Gulf produced the world’s best pearls. Nowadays, the
major remaining suppliers of natural pearls belong to India.
A America B Ancient Rome C Australia
D Bahrain E China F Japan G India
H Korea I Mexico J Persia K Spain
Questions 37-40
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
37 Often cultured pearl’s center is significantly larger than in a natural pearl.
38 Cultivated cultured pearls are generally valued the same as natural ones.
39 The size of pearls produced in Japan is usually of a smaller size than those came from
Australia.
40 Akoya pearls from Japan Glows more deeply than the South Sea pearls of Australia
 IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 35 with Answer
READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
The Research for Intelligence
A
In Robert Plomin’s line of work, patience is essential. Plomin, a behavioral geneticist at the
Institute of Psychiatry in London, wants to understand the nature of intelligence. As part of
his research, he has been watching thousands of children grow up. Plomin asks the children
questions such as “What do water and milk have in common?” and “In what direction does
the sun set?” At first he and his colleagues quizzed the children in person or over the
telephone. Today many of those children are in their early teens, and they take their tests on
the Internet. In one sense, the research has been a rousing success. The children who take
the tests are all twins, and throughout the study identical twins have tended to get scores
closer to each other than those of non-identical twins, who in turn have closer scores than
unrelated children. These results— along with similar ones from other studies— make clear
to the scientists that genes have an important influence on how children score on
intelligence tests.
B
But Plomin wants to know more. He wants to find the specific genes that are doing the
influencing. And now he has a tool for pinpointing genes that he could not have even
dreamed of when he began quizzing children. Plomin and his colleagues have been
scanning the genes of his subjects with a device called a micro array, a small chip that can
recognize half a million distinctive snippets of DNA. The combination of this powerful tool
with a huge number of children to study meant that he could detect genes that had only a
tiny effect on the variation in scores.
C
Still, when Plomin and his co-workers unveiled the results of their micro-array study—the
biggest dragnet for intelligence-linked genes ever undertaken—they were underwhelming.
The researchers found only six genetic markers that showed any sign of having an influence
on the test scores. When they ran stringent statistical tests to see if the results were flukes,
only one gene passed. It accounted for 0.4 percent of variation in the scores. And to cap it
all off, no one knows what the gene does in the body.” It’s a real drag in some ways,” Plomin
says.
D
Plomin’s experience is a typical one for scientists who study intelligence. Along with using
micro-arrays, they are employing brain scans and other sophisticated technologies to
document some of the intricate dance steps that genes and environment take together in the
development of intelligence. They are beginning to see how differences in intelligence are
reflected in the structure and function of the brain. Some scientists have even begun to build
a new vision of intelligence as a reflection of the ways in which information flows through the
brain. But for all these advances, intelligence remains a profound mystery. “It’s amazing the
extent to which we know very little,” says Wendy Johnson, a psychologist at the University
of Minnesota.
E
In some ways, intelligence is very simple. “It’s something that everybody observes in
others,” says Eric Turkheimer of the University of Virginia. Everybody knows that some
people are smarter than others, whatever it means technically. It’s something you sense in
people when you talk to them. “Yet that kind of gut instinct does not translate easily into a
scientific definition. In 1996 the American Psychological Association issued a report on
intelligence, which stated only that “individuals differ from one another in their ability to
understand complex ideas, to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience,
to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by taking thought.”
F
To measure these differences, psychologists in the early 1900s invented tests of various
kinds of thought, such as math, spatial reasoning and verbal skills. To compare scores on
one type of test to those on another, some psychologists developed standard scales of
intelligence. The most familiar of them is the intelligence quotient, which is produced by
setting the average score at 100. IQ scores are not arbitrary numbers, however.
Psychologists can use them to make strong predictions about other features of people’s
lives. It is possible to make reasonably good predictions, based on IQ scores in childhood,
about how well people will fare in school and in the workplace. People with high IQs even
tend to live longer than average.” If you have an IQ score, does that tell you everything
about a person’s cognitive strengths and weaknesses? No,” says Richard J. Haier of the
University of California, Irvine. But even a simple number has the potential to say a lot about
a person. “When you go see your doctor, what’s the first thing that happens? Somebody
takes your blood pressure and temperature. So you get two numbers. No one would say
blood pressure and temperature summarize everything about your health, but they are key
numbers.”
G
Then what underlies an intelligence score?” It’s certainly tapping something,” says Philip
Shaw, a psychiatrist at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). The most influential
theory of what the score reflects is more than a century old. In 1904 psychologist Charles
Spearman observed that people who did well on one kind of test tended to do well on
others. The link from one score to another was not very tight, but Spearman saw enough of
a connection to declare that it was the result of something he called a g factor, short for
general intelligence factor. How general intelligence arose from the brain, Spearman could
not say. In recent decades, scientists have searched for an answer by finding patterns in the
test scores of large groups of people. Roughly speaking, there are two possible sources for
these variations. Environmental influences— anything from the way children are raised by
their parents to the diseases they may suffer as they develop 一 are one source. Genes are
another. Genes may shape the brain in ways that make individuals better or worse at
answering questions on intelligence tests.
Questions 1-6
The reading passage has seven paragraphs, A-G.
Choose the correct heading for paragraphs B-G from the list below.
Write the correct number, i-x, in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet
List of Headings
i Low probability triggers unpersuasive findings
ii Understanding of intelligence remains limited
iii Difficulty in accurately defining intelligence
iv People with high IQ seldom fall sick
v An innovative appliance to improve the probe
vi The financial cost of a new research
vii Why an indicator is imperfect but referable
viii Genes mean extra when compared with environment
ix A vital indicator for kids’ intelligence performance
x Multiple factors involved in intelligence
Example Answer
Paragraph A ix
1 Paragraph B
2 Paragraph C
3 Paragraph D
4 Paragraph E
5 Paragraph F
6 Paragraph G
Questions 7-10
Use the information in the passage to match the people (listed A-G) with opinions or deeds
below.
Write the appropriate letters A-G in boxes 7-10 on your answer sheet.
A Plomin
B Philip Shawn
C Eric Turkheimer
D Charles Spearman
E Richard J. Haier
F Wendy Johnson
7 A full conclusion can be hardly reached just by the one example in IQ test.
8 It is not easy to exclude the occasionality existed in the research.
9 Humans still have more to explore in terms of the real nature of intelligence.
10 It is quite difficult to find the real origins where the general intelligence comes.
Questions 11-13
Summary
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE
THAN THREE WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.
Many researchers including Plomin have faced with the typical challenge
when 11 _________ are implemented. They try to use all possible methods to record
certain 12 _________ performed both by genes and environment which contributes to the
progress of intelligence. The relationship between intelligence and brain become their
targeted area. What’s more, according to some researchers, intelligence is regarded to
be 13 _________ of how messages transmit in the brain.
READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
The Sweet Scent of Success
A
Innovation and entrepreneurship, in the right mix, can bring spectacular results and propel a
business ahead of the pack. Across a diverse range of commercial successes, from the Hills
Hoist clothes line to the Cochlear ear implant, it is hard to generalize beyond saying the
creators tapped into something consumers could not wait to get their hands on. However,
most ideas never make it to the market. Some ideas that innovators are spruiking to
potential investors include new water-saving shower heads, a keyless locking system, ping-
pong balls that keep pollution out of rainwater tanks, making teeth grow from stem cells
inserted in the gum, and technology to stop LPG tanks from exploding. Grant Kearney, chief
executive of the Innovation Xchange, which connects businesses to innovation networks,
says he hears of great business ideas that he knows will never get on the market. “Ideas by
themselves are absolutely useless,” he says. “An idea only becomes innovation when it is
connected to the right resources and capabilities”.
B
One of Australia’s latest innovation successes stems from a lemon-scented bathroom
cleaner called Shower Power, the formula for which was concocted in a factory in Yatala,
Queensland. In 1995, Tom Quinn and John Heron bought a struggling cleaning products
business, OzKleen, for 250,000. It was selling 100 different kinds of cleaning products,
mainly in bulk. The business was in bad shape, the cleaning formulas were ineffective and
environmentally harsh, and there were few regular clients. Now Shower Power is claimed to
be the top-selling bathroom cleaning product in the country. In the past 12 months, almost
four million bottles of OzKleen’s Power products have been sold and the company forecasts
2004 sales of 10 million bottles. The company’s, sales in2003 reached $11 million, with 70%
of business being exports. In particular, Shower Power is making big inroads on the British
market.
C
OzKleen’s turnaround began when Quinn and Heron hired an industrial chemist to revitalize
the product line. Market research showed that people were looking for a better cleaner for
the bathroom, universally regarded as the hardest room in the home to clean. The company
also wanted to make the product formulas more environmentally friendly One of Tom
Quinn’s sons, Peter, aged 24 at the time, began working with the chemist on the formulas,
looking at the potential for citrus-based cleaning products. He detested all the chlorine-
based cleaning products that dominated the market. “We didn’t want to use chlorine, simple
as that,” he says. “It offers bad working conditions and there’s no money in it.” Peter looked
at citrus ingredients, such as orange peel, to replace the petroleum by-products in cleaners.
He is credited with finding the Shower Power formula. “The head,” he says. The company is
the recipe is in a vault somewhere and in my sole owner of the intellectual property.
D
To begin with, Shower Power was sold only in commercial quantities but Tom Quinn
decided to sell it in 750ml bottles after the constant “raves” from customers at their retail
store at Beenleigh, near Brisbane. Customers were travelling long distances to buy supplies.
Others began writing to OzKleen to say how good Shower Power was. “We did a dummy
label and went to see Woolworths,” Tom Quinn says. The Woolworths buyer took a bottle
home and was able to remove a stain from her basin that had been impossible to shift. From
that point on, she championed the product and OzKleen had its first supermarket order, for a
palette of Shower Power worth $3000. “We were over the moon,” says OzKleen’s financial
controller, Belinda McDonnell.
E
Shower Power was released in Australian supermarkets in 1997 and became the top-selling
product in its category within six months. It was all hands on deck cat the factory, labelling
and bottling Shower Power to keep up with demand. OzKleen ditched all other products and
rebuilt the business around Shower Power. This stage, recalls McDonnell, was very tough.
“It was hand-to-mouth, cash flow was very difficult,” she says. OzKleen had to pay new-line
fees to supermarket chains, which also squeezed margins.
F
OzKleen’s next big break came when the daughter of a Coles Myer executive used the
product while on holidays in Queensland and convinced her father that Shower Power
should be in Coles supermarkets. Despite the product success, Peter Quinn says the
company was wary of how long the sales would last and hesitated to spend money on
upgrading the manufacturing process. As a result, he remembers long periods of working
round the clock to keep up with orders. Small tanks were still being used, so batches were
small and bottles were labelled and filled manually. The privately owned OzKleen relied on
cash flow to expand. “The equipment could not keep up with demand,” Peter Quinn says.
Eventually a new bottling machine was bought for $50,000 in the hope of streamlining
production, but he says: “We got ripped off.” Since then, he has been developing a new
automated bottling machine that can control the amount of foam produced in the liquid, so
that bottles can be filled more effectively – “I love coming up with new ideas.” The machine
is being patented.
G
Peter Quinn says OzKleen’s approach to research and development is open slather. “If I
need it, I get it. It is about doing something simple that no one else is doing. Most of these
things are just sitting in front of people … it’s just seeing the opportunities.” With a tried and
tested product, OzKleen is expanding overseas and developing more Power-brand
household products. Tom Quinn, who previously ran a real estate agency, says: “We are
competing with the same market all over the world, the cleaning products are sold
everywhere.” Shower Power, known as Bath Power in Britain, was launched four years ago
with the help of an export development grant from the Federal Government. “We wanted to
do it straight away because we realised we had the same opportunities worldwide.” OzKleen
is already number three in the British market, and the next stop is France. The Power range
includes cleaning products for carpets, kitchens and pre-wash stain removal. The Quinn and
Heron families are still involved. OzKleen has been approached with offers to buy the
company, but Tom Quinn says he is happy with things as they are. “We’re having too much
fun.”
Questions 14-20
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-G.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter A-G, in boxes 14-20 on your answer sheet.
14 Description of one family member persuading another of selling cleaning products
15 An account of the cooperation of all factory staff to cope with sales increase
16 An account of the creation of the formula of Shower Power
17 An account of buying the original OzKleen company
18 Description of Shower Power’s international expansion
19 The reason for changing the packaging size of Shower Power
20 An example of some innovative ideas
Questions 21-24
Look at the following people and the list of statements below.
Match each person with the correct statement.
Write the correct letter A-E in boxes 21-24 on your answer sheet
21 Grant Kearney
22 Tom Quinn
23 Peter Quinn
24 Belinda McDonnell
List of Statement
A Described his story of selling his product to a chain store
B Explained there was a shortage of money when sales suddenly increased
C Believe innovations need support to succeed
D Believes new products like Shower Power may incur risks
E Says business won’t succeed with innovations
Questions 25-26
Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D.
Write your answers in boxes 25-26 on your answer sheet.
25 Tom Quinn changed the bottle size to 750ml to make Shower Power
A easier to package.
B appealing to individual customers.
C popular in foreign markets.
D attractive to supermarkets.
26 Why did Tom Quinn decide not to sell OzKleen?
A No one wanted to buy OzKleen.
B New products were being developed in OzKleen.
C He couldn’t make an agreement on the price with the buyer.
D He wanted to keep things unchanged.
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Tattoo on Tikopia
A
There are still debates about the origins of Polynesian culture, but one thing we can ensure
is that Polynesia is not a single tribe but a complex one. Polynesians which include
Marquesans, Samoans, Niueans, Tongans, Cook Islanders, Hawaiians, Tahitians, and
Maori, are genetically linked to indigenous peoples of parts of Southeast Asia. It’s a sub-
region of Oceania, comprising of a large grouping of over 1,000 islands scattered over the
central and southern Pacific Ocean, within a triangle that has New Zealand, Hawaii and
Easter Island as its corners.
B
Polynesian history has fascinated the western world since Pacific cultures were first
contacted by European explorers in the late 18th century. The small island of Tikopia, for
many people – even for many Solomon Islanders – is so far away that it seems like a
mythical land; a place like Narnia, that magical land in C. S. Lewis’ classic, ‘The Chronicles
of Narnia.’ Maybe because of it – Tikopia, its people, and their cultures have long fascinated
scholars, travelers, and casual observers. Like the pioneers Peter Dillion, Dumont D’Urville
and John Coleridge Patterson who visit and write about the island in the 1800s, Raymond
Firth is one of those people captured by the alluring attraction of Tikopia. As a result, he had
made a number of trips to the island since the 1920s and recorded his experiences,
observations, and reflections on Tikopia, its people, cultures and the changes that have
occurred.
C
While engaged in the study of the kinship and religious life of the people of Tikopia, Firth
made a few observations on their tattooing. Brief though these notes are they may be worth
putting on record as an indication of the sociological setting of the practice in this primitive
Polynesian community. The origin of the English word ‘tattoo’ actually comes from the
Tikopia word ‘tatau’. The word for tattoo marks, in general, is tau, and the operation of
tattooing is known as ta tau, ta being the generic term for the act of striking.
D
The technique of tattooing was similar throughout Polynesia. Traditional tattoo artists create
their indelible tattoos using pigment made from the candlenut or kukui nut. First, they burn
the nut inside a bowl made of half a coconut shell. They then scrape out the soot and use a
pestle to mix it with liquid. Bluing is sometimes added to counteract the reddish hue of the
carbon-based pigment. It also makes the outline of the inscribed designs bolder on the dark
skin of tattooing subjects.
E
For the instruments used when tattooing, specialists used a range of chisels made from
albatross wing bone which were hafted onto a handle which was made from the heart wood
of the bush and struck with a mallet. The tattooer began by sketching with charcoal a design
on the supine subject, whose skin at that location was stretched taut by one or more
apprentices. The tattooer then dipped the appropriate points – eighter a single one or a
whole comb – into the ink (usually contained in a coconut-shell cup) and tapped it into the
subject’s skin, holding the blade handle in one hand and tapping it with the other. The blood
that usually trickled from the punctures was wiped away either by the tattooer or his
apprentice, the latter having also inevitably painful – a test of fortitude that tattooers sought
to shorten by working as fast as possible. In fact, tattoos nearly always festered and often
led to sickness – and in some cases death.
F
In ancient Polynesian society, nearly everyone was tattooed. It was an integral part of
ancient culture and was much more than a body ornament. Tattooing indicated ones’
genealogy and/or rank in society. It was a sign of wealth, of strength and of the ability to
endure pain. Those who went without them were seen as persons of lower social status. As
such, chiefs and warriors generally had the most elaborate tattoos. Tattooing was generally
begun at adolescence, and would often not be completed for a number of years. Receiving
tattoos constituted an important milestone between childhood and adulthood, and was
accompanied by many rites and rituals. Apart from signaling status and rank, another
reason for the practice in traditional times was to make a person more attractive to the
opposite sex.
G
The male facial tattoo is generally divided into eight sections of the face. The center of the
forehead designated a person’s general rank. The area around the brows designated his
position. The area around the eyes and the nose designated his hapu, or sub-tribe rank. The
area around the temples served to details his signature. This signature was once
memorized by tribal chiefs who used it when buying property, signing deeds, and officiating
orders. The cheek area designated the nature of the person’s work. The chin area showed
the person’s mana. Lastly, the jaw area designated a person’s birth status.
H
A person’s ancestry is indicated on each side of the face. The left side is generally the
father’s side, and the right side was the mother’s. The manutahi design is worked on the
men’s back. It consists of two vertical lines drawn down the spine, with short vertical lines
between them. When a man had the manutahi on his back, he took pride in himself. At
gatherings of the people he could stand forth in their midst and display his tattoo designs
with songs. And rows of triangles design on the men’s chest indicate his bravery.
I
Tattoo was a way delivering information of its owner. It’s also a traditional method to fetch
spiritual power, protection and strength. The Polynesians use this as a sign of character,
position and levels in a hierarchy. Polynesian peoples believe that a person’s mana, their
spiritual power or life force, is displayed through their tattoo.
Questions 27-30
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 27-30 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement is true
NO if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
27 Scientists like to do research in Tikopia because this tiny place is of great remoteness.
28 Firth was the first scholar to study on Tikopia.
29 Firth studied the culture differences on Tikopia as well as on some other islands of
Pacific.
30 The English word ‘tattoo’ is evolved from the local language of the island.
Questions 31-35
Label the diagram below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from Reading Passage for each answer.
bowl made of 31 _______ burn the material inside to get 32 _______, and stir in
the 33 _______
produced from 34 _______ of small trees
produced from 35 _______ of seabird
Questions 36-40
Complete the notes below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.
LOCATION ON THE GEOMETRIC
SIGNIFICANCE
BODY PATTERNS

36 ________ of male
general rank
face

37 ________ of male
prestige
face

Female’s right side of

38 ________
the face

male back sense of pride 39 ________

male chest bravery 40 ________

 IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 34 with Answer
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READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
The Adolescents
A
The American Academy of Pediatrics recognizes three stages of adolescence. These are
early, middle and late adolescence, and each has its own developmental tasks. Teenagers
move through these tasks at their own speed depending on their physical development and
hormone levels. Although these stages are common to all teenagers, each child will go
through them in his or her own highly individual ways.
B
During the early years young people make the first attempts to leave the dependent, secure
role of a child and to establish themselves as unique individuals, independent of their
parents. Early adolescence is marked by rapid physical growth and maturation. The focus of
adolescents’ self-concepts is thus often on their physical self and their evaluation of their
physical acceptability. Early adolescence is also a period of intense conformity to peers.
‘Getting along,’ not being different, and being accepted seem somehow pressing to the early
adolescent. The worst possibility, from the view of the early adolescent, is to be seen by
peers as ‘different’.
C
Middle adolescence is marked by the emergence of new thinking skills. The intellectual
world of the young person is suddenly greatly expanded. Their concerns about peers are
more directed toward their opposite sexed peers. It is also during this period that the move
to establish psychological independence from one’s parents accelerates. Delinquency
behavior may emerge since parental views are no longer seen as absolutely correct by
adolescents. Despite some delinquent behavior, middle adolescence is a period during
which young people are oriented toward what is right and proper. They are developing a
sense of behavioral maturity and learning to control their impulsiveness.
D
Late adolescence is marked by the final preparations for adult roles. The developmental
demands of late adolescence often extend into the period that we think of as young
adulthood. Late adolescents attempt to crystallize their vocational goals and to establish a
sense of personal identity. Their needs for peer approval are diminished and they are largely
psychologically independent from their parents. The shift to adulthood is nearly complete.
E
Some years ago, Professor Robert Havighurst of the University of Chicago proposed that
stages in human development can best be thought of in terms of the developmental tasks
that are part of the normal transition. He identified eleven developmental tasks associated
with the adolescent transition. One developmental task an adolescent needs to achieve is to
adjust to a new physical sense of self. At no other time since birth does an individual
undergo such rapid and profound physical changes as during early adolescence. Puberty is
marked by sudden rapid growth in height and weight. Also, the young person experiences
the emergence and accentuation of those physical traits that make him or her a boy or girl.
The effect of this rapid change is that young adolescent often becomes focused on his or
her body.
F
Before adolescence, children’s thinking is dominated by a need to have a concrete example
for any problem that they solve. Their thinking is constrained to what is real and physical.
During adolescence, young people begin to recognize and understand abstractions. The
adolescent must adjust to increased cognitive demands at school. Adults see high school in
part as a place where adolescents prepare for adult roles and responsibilities and in part as
preparatory for further education. School curricula are frequently dominated by the inclusion
of more abstract, demanding material, regardless of whether the adolescents have achieved
formal thought. Since not all adolescents make the intellectual transition at the same rate,
demands for abstract thinking prior to achievement of that ability may be frustrating.
G
During adolescence, as teens develop increasingly complex knowledge systems and a
sense of self, they also adopt an integrated set of values and morals. During the early
stages of moral development, parents provide their child with a structured set of rules of
what is right and wrong, what is acceptable and unacceptable. Eventually, the adolescent
must assess the parents’ values as they come into conflict with values expressed by peers
and other segments of society. To reconcile differences, the adolescent restructures those
beliefs into a personal ideology.
H
The adolescent must develop expanded verbal skills. As adolescents mature intellectually,
as they face increased school demands, and as they prepare for adult roles, they must
develop new verbal skills to accommodate more complex concepts and tasks. Their limited
language of childhood is no longer adequate. Adolescents may appear less competent
because of their inability to express themselves meaningfully.
I
The adolescent must establish emotional and psychological independence from his or her
parents. Childhood is marked by a strong dependence on one’s parents. Adolescents may
yearn to keep that safe, secure, supportive, dependent relationship. Yet, to be an adult
implies a sense of independence, of autonomy, of being one’s own person. Adolescents
may vacillate between their desire for dependence and their need to be independent. In an
attempt to assert their need for independence and individuality, adolescents may respond
with what appears to be hostility and lack of cooperation.
J
Adolescents do not progress through these multiple developmental tasks separately. At any
given time, adolescents may be dealing with several. Further, the centrality of specific
developmental tasks varies with early, middle, and late periods of the transition.
Questions 1-6
Match the following characteristics with the correct stages of the adolescent.
Write the correct letter, A, B or C, in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet.
A early adolescence
B middle adolescence
C later adolescence
1 interested in the opposite sex
2 exposure to danger
3 the same as others
4 beginning to form individual thinking without family context
5 less need the approval of friends
6 intellectual booming
Questions 7-10
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-F, below.
Write the correct letters, A-F, in boxes 7-10 on your answer sheet.
7 One of Havighurst’s research
8 High School Courses
9 Adolescence is a time when young people
10 The developmental speed of thinking patterns
A form personal identity with a set of morals and values
B develops a table and productive peer relationships
C are designed to be more challenging than some can accept
D varies from people to people
E focuses on creating a self-image
F become an extension of their parents
Questions 11-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
11 The adolescent lacks the ability to think abstractly.
12 Adolescents may have a deficit in their language ability.
13 The adolescent experiences a transition from reliance on his parents to independence.
READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
Ancient Chinese Chariots
The Shang Dynasty or Yin Dynasty, according to traditional historiography, ruled in the
Yellow River valley in the second millennium BC. Archaeological work at the Ruins of Yin
(near modern-day Anyang), which has been identified as the last Shang capital, uncovered
eleven major Yin royal tombs and the foundations of palaces and ritual sites, containing
weapons of war and remains from both animal and human sacrifices.
The Tomb of Fu Hao is an archaeological site at Yinxu, the ruins of the ancient Shang
Dynasty capital Yin, within the modern city of Anyang in Henan Province, China. Discovered
in 1976, it was identified as the final resting place of the queen and military general Fu Hao.
The artefacts unearthed within the grave included jade objects, bone objects, bronze objects
etc. These grave goods are confirmed by the oracle texts, which constitute almost all of the
first hand written record we possess of the Shang Dynasty. Below the corpse was a small pit
holding the remains of six sacrificial dogs and along the edge lay the skeletons of human
slaves, evidence of human sacrifice.
The Terracotta Army was discovered on 29 March 1974 to the east of Xi’an in Shaanxi. The
terracotta soldiers were accidentally discovered when a group of local farmers was digging a
well during a drought around 1.6 km (1 mile) east of the Qin Emperors tomb around at
Mount Li (Lishan), a region riddled with underground springs and watercourses. Experts
currently place the entire number of soldiers at 8,000 – with 130 chariots (130 cm long), 530
horses and 150 cavalry horses helping to ward off any dangers in the afterlife. In contrast,
the burial of Tutankhamun yielded six complete but dismantled chariots of unparalleled
richness and sophistication. Each was designed for two people (90 cm long) and had its
axle sawn through to enable it to be brought along the narrow corridor into the tomb.
Excavation of ancient Chinese chariots has confirmed the descriptions of them in the
earliest texts. Wheels were constructed from a variety of woods: elm provided the hub, rose-
wood the spokes and oak the felloes. The hub was drilled through to form an empty space
into which the tampering axle was fitted, the whole being covered with leather to retain
lubricating oil. Though the number of spokes varied, a wheel by the fourth century BC
usually had eighteen to thirty-two of them. Records show how elaborate was the testing of
each completed wheel: flotation and weighing were regarded as the best measures of
balance, but even the empty spaces in the assembly were checked with millet grains. One
outstanding constructional asset of the ancient Chinese wheel was dishing. Dishing refers to
the dish-like shape of an advanced wooden wheel, which looks rather like a flat cone. On
occasion they chose to strengthen a dished wheel with a pair of struts running from rim to
rim on each of the hub. As these extra supports were inserted separately into the felloes,
they would have added even greater strength to the wheel. Leather wrapped up the edge of
the wheel aimed to retain bronze.
Within a millennium, however, Chinese chariot-makers had developed a vehicle with shafts,
the precursor of the true carriage or cart. This design did not make its appearance in Europe
until the end of the Roman Empire. Because the shafts curved upwards, and the harness
pressed against a horse’s shoulders, not his neck, the shaft chariot was incredibly efficient.
The halberd was also part of a chariot standard weaponry. This halberd usually measured
well over 3 meters in length, which meant that a chariot warrior wielding it sideways could
strike down the charioteer in a passing chariot. The speed of chariot which was tested on
the sand was quite fast. At speed these passes were very dangerous for the crews of both
chariots.
The advantages offered by the new chariots were not entirely missed. They could see how
there were literally the Warring States, whose conflicts lasted down the Qin unification of
China. Qin Shi Huang was buried in the most opulent tomb complex ever constructed in
China, a sprawling, city-size collection of underground caverns containing everything the
emperor would need for the afterlife. Even a collection of terracotta armies called Terra-
Cotta Warriors was buried in it. The ancient Chinese, along with many cultures including
ancient Egyptians, believed that items and even people buried with a person could be taken
with him to the afterlife.
Questions 14-17
Do the following statements agree with the information in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 14-17 on your answer sheet write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
14 When Tomb of Fu Hao was discovered, the written records of the grave goods proved
to be accurate.
15 Human skeletons in Anyang tomb were identified as soldiers who were killed in the war.
16 The Terracotta Army was discovered by people lived nearby by chance.
17 The size of the King Tutankhamun’s tomb is bigger than that of in Qin Emperors’ tomb.
Questions 18-23
Complete the notes below.
Choose ONE WORD from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 18–23 on your answer sheet.

18 The hub is made wood from the tree of ___________

19 The room through the hub was to put tempered axle, which is wrapped up by leather,
aiming to retain ___________
20 The number of spokes varied from ___________
21 The shape of wheel resembles a ___________
22 Two___________ was used to strengthen the wheel.
23 The edge of the wheel was wrapped up by leather aiming to retain ___________
Questions 24-26
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for
each answer.
24 What body part of the horse was released the pressure from to the horse shoulder after
the appearance of the shafts?
25 What kind of road surface did the researchers measure the speed of the chariot on?
26 What part of his afterlife palace was the Emperor Qin Shi Huang buried in?
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Homeopathy
Overdosing on nothing
A
An international protest this week aims to demonstrate the truth about homoeopathy – that
there/s literally nothing in it, says Martin Robbins AT 10.23 am on 30 January, more than
300 activists in the UK, Canada, Australia and the US will take part in a mass homoeopathic
“overdose”. Skeptics will publicly swallow an entire bottle of homoeopathic pills to
demonstrate to the public that homoeopathic remedies, the product of a scientifically
unfounded 18th-century ritual, are simply sugar pills. Many of the sceptics will swallow 84
pills of Arsenicum album, a homoeopathic remedy based on arsenic which is used to treat a
range of symptoms, including food poisoning and insomnia. The aim of the “10:23”
campaign, led by the Merseyside Skeptics Society, based in Liverpool, UK, is to raise public
awareness of just exactly what homeopathy is, and to put pressure on the UK’s leading
pharmacist, Boots, to remove the remedies from sale. The campaign is called 10:23in honor
of the Avogadro constant (approximately 6 x 1023, the number of atoms or molecules in one
mole of a substance), of which more later.
B
That such a protest is even necessary in 2010 is remarkable, but somehow the homeopathic
industry has not only survived into the 21st century, but prospered. In the UK alone more
than £40 million is spent annually on homoeopathic treatments, with £4 million of this being
sucked from the National Health Service budget. Yet the basis for homoeopathy defies the
laws of physics, and high-quality clinical trials have never been able to demonstrate that it
works beyond the placebo effect.
C
The discipline is based on three “laws”; the law of similars, the law of infinitesimals and the
law of succession. The law of similars states that something which causes your symptoms
will cure your symptoms, so that, for example, as caffeine keeps you awake, it can also be a
cure for insomnia. Of course, that makes little sense, since drinking caffeine, well, keeps you
awake. Next is the law of infinitesimals, which claims that diluting a substance makes it
more potent. Homoeopaths start by diluting one volume of their remedy -arsenic oxide, in
the case of Arsenicum album -in 99 volumes of distilled water or alcohol to create a
“centesimal”. They then dilute one volume of the centesimal in 99 volumes of water or
alcohol, and so on, up to 30 times. Application of Avogadro’s constant tells you that a dose
of such a “30C” recipe is vanishingly unlikely to contain even a single molecule of the active
ingredient. The third pillar of homoeopathy is the law of succession. This states-and I’m not
making this up -that by tapping the liquid in a special way during the dilution process, a
memory of the active ingredient is somehow imprinted on it. This explains how water is able
to carry a memory of arsenic oxide, but apparently not of the contents of your local sewer
network.
D
The final preparation is generally dropped onto a sugar pill which the patient swallows.
Homeopaths claim that the application of these three laws results in a remedy that, even
though it contains not a single molecule of the original ingredient, somehow carries an
“energy signature” of it that nobody can measure or detect. Unsurprisingly, when tested
under rigorous scientific conditions, in randomized, controlled and double-blind trials,
homoeopathic remedies have consistently been shown to be no better than a placebo. Of
course, the placebo effect is quite powerful, but it’s a bit like justifying building a car without
any wheels on the basis that you can still enjoy the comfy leather seats and play with the
gear shift.
E
Even some retailers who sell the treatments have admitted there is no evidence that they
work. In November, Paul Bennett, the superintendent pharmacist at Boots, appeared before
the UK parliament’s Commons Science and Technology Committee’s “evidence check” on
homoeopathy. He was questioned by Member of Parliament Phil Willis, who asked: “Do they
work beyond the placebo effect?””I have no evidence before me to suggest that they are
efficacious,” Bennett replied. He defended Boots’s decision to sell homoeopathic remedies
on the grounds of consumer choice. “A large number of our consumers actually do believe
they are efficacious, but they are licensed medicinal products and, therefore, we believe it is
right to make them available,” he said.
F
You might agree. You might also argue that homoeopathy is harmless: if people want to part
with their money for sugar pills and nobody is breaking the law, why not let them? To some
extent that’s true -there’s only so much damage you can do with sugar pills short of feeding
them to a diabetic or dropping a large crate of them on someone’s head. However, we
believe there is a risk in perpetuating the notion that homoeopathy is equivalent to modern
medicine. People may delay seeking appropriate treatment for themselves or their children.
G
We accept that we are unlikely to convince the true believers. Homoeopathy has many ways
to sidestep awkward questions, such as rejecting the validity of randomized controlled trials,
or claiming that homoeopathic remedies only work if you have symptoms of the malady they
purport to cure. Our aim is to reach out to the general public with our simple message:
“There is nothing in it”. Boots and other retailers are perfectly entitled to continue selling
homoeopathic remedies if they so wish and consumers are perfectly entitled to keep on
buying them. But hopefully the 10:23 campaign will ram home our message to the public. In
the 21st century, with decades of progress behind us, it is surreal that governments are
prepared to spend millions of tax pounds on homoeopathy. There really is nothing in it.
Questions 27-33
Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of heading below.
Write the correct number, i-ix, in boxes 27-33 on your answer sheet.
List of Headings
i The definition of three laws
ii Quoting three laws to against the homeopathy
iii There are many methods of avoiding answering ambiguous questions.
iv The purpose of illustrating the symptoms of homeopathy
v The constant booming of homeopathy
vi Some differences between homeopathy and placebo
vii Placebo is better than homeopathy
viii A example of further demonstrating the negative effect of homeopathy.
ix The purpose of staging a demonstration to against homeopathy
14 Paragraph A
15 Paragraph B
16 Paragraph C
17 Paragraph D
18 Paragraph E
19 Paragraph F
20 Paragraph G
Questions 34-40
Do the following statements agree with the information given in the Reading passage 3?
In boxes 34-40 on your answer sheet write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN If the information is not given in the passage
34 Skeptics planning to hold a demonstration in the “10.23″campaign is against UK’s
leading pharmacist, Boots.
35 National Health Service budget gained a small portion of homoeopathic industry
36 The example of Caffeine is to present that homoeopathy resists the laws of similars.
37 Instilling the idea to people that homoeopathy is equal to modern medicine poses
danger.
38 Paul Bennett claimed effectiveness of taking the homoeopathic medicine is proved
39 The adoption of homoeopathy mainly contributes to the delay in seeking appropriate
treatment for themselves or their children.
40 The campaign has exerted pressure on Boots and other retailers.
IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 33 with Answer
IELTS Reading Recent Actual Tests with Answers
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READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
The last March of the Emperor Penguins
A
THE emperor penguin is an impossible bird. It breeds in the middle of winter in some of the
coldest places on Earth, surviving temperatures as low as -50℃ and hurricane-force winds.
In March or April, just as the Antarctic winter begins, the birds waddle across the sea ice to
their colonies, where they mate. After the egg is laid, the females head back to sea to feed,
leaving the males behind to incubate it. By the time the females return in July or August,
when the eggs hatch, the males will have spent almost four months huddling together in the
bitter cold without eating, losing half of their body weight. This extraordinary lifestyle has
made the emperors famous. They have even been held up as role models by evangelical
Christians. But these breathtaking birds will soon have to face the one thing they haven’t
evolved to cope with: warmth. Fast-forward a few decades, and many colonies will be on the
road to extinction. Are we witnessing the last march of the emperor penguins?
B
Finding out what’s going on with emperor penguins is a huge challenge as almost all of their
colonies are exceedingly difficult to get to. In fact, it was only this year that the first global
census of the birds was published, based on an automated analysis of satellite images by
the British Antarctic Survey. This revealed four previously unknown colonies, bringing the
total to 46 (see map), and put the number of adults at 600,000, nearly double earlier
estimates. That might sound like good news, but it’s impossible to say whether the overall
number of birds is rising or falling. “It’s simply that we now have a better method to find
them-remote sensing,” says team member Phil Trathan.
C
By far the most comprehensive insight into the highs and lows of emperor populations
comes from just one colony, which happens to be next to the Dumont d’Urville research
station on the Adelie coast of Antarctica. “After a snowstorm, they can see how many eggs
have got frozen, and how many chicks have died,” says biologist Stephanie Jenouvrier of
the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, who studies the birds. This
relatively small colony of 2500 birds featured in the 2005 blockbuster documentary March of
the Penguins.
D
The Dumont d’Urville emperor’s have been closely monitored since 1962. During the 1970s
and early 80s, the average winter temperature was-14.7℃, compared with a more typical-
17.3℃. This “warm spell” reduced the extent of winter sea ice by around 11 percent and the
penguin population by half. “When sea ice decreased, it caused strong mortality of emperor
penguins,” says Jenouvrier. Why are emperors so sensitive to changes in sea ice? Well to
start with, most never set foot on land. They aren’t agile enough to scale the steep rocks
and ice precipices that guard most of Antarctica’s shoreline. All but two of the 46 colonies
are on fast ice-sea ice stuck fast to the shore. So if the sea ice forms late or breaks up early,
it won’t last for the eight months or so these large birds need to breed and raise chicly.
E
“Early break-up of sea ice can cause catastrophic breeding failure,” says Trathan. Emperors
live around 20 years, so colonies can survive a few bad breeding seasons, but persistent
changes can be disastrous. What’s more, emperors moult every year in January or
February. The birds would freeze to death if they tried to swim during the 30 or so days it
takes to grow new feathers, so they must find ice floes to shelter on that are large enough to
survive this period. This may be an even more demanding period in the emperors’ lives than
the winter, because they have little time to fatten themselves up beforehand. “The adults are
reliant on stable sea ice for moulting, and for me, that’s the greatest concern,” says Gerald
Kooyman of Scripps Institution of Oceanography, one of the world’s leading emperor
penguin biologists. “They don’t have any options. They have to moult.”
F
Last, but not least, the source of much of the penguins’ energy, directly or indirectly, is krill-
and krill also depend on sea ice. Young krill shelter and feed under it. “The sea ice is the
basis of the Antarctic ecosystem,” says Jenouvrier. For now, there is still plenty of sea ice. In
fact, the extent of Antarctic sea ice in winter has increased slightly over the last 30 years.
This has been caused by stronger winds blowing sea ice further away from the land, with
more ice forming in the open water exposed by this movement. The stronger winds are
thought to be a consequence of ozone loss, rather than global warming.
G
But unlike the Arctic Ocean, where thick sea ice used to survive from year to year, in
Antarctica almost all the sea ice melts every year. That means the extent of winter sea ice
changes rapidly in response to any change in conditions. This can be seen around the
rapidly warming Antarctic Peninsula, where winter sea ice extent is falling 1 or 2 percent
each year. Here one small emperor colony, on the Dion Islands, has already died out. When
it was discovered in 1948 it was home to 300 adults. By 1999， just 40 remained and 10
years later they were all gone. Though no one knows for sure what caused the colony’s
demise, it coincided with a decline in the duration of winter sea ice. On the peninsula,
populations of the other Antarctic native penguins, the Adelie and chinstrap, are also
plummeting, probably because of the changing environment and declining krill. Matters
haven’t been helped by an invasion of non-native gentoo penguins, and other species like
the king and macaroni penguins could follow.
H
What’s happening on the peninsula today could be happening all around Antarctica in the
decades to come. “With a doubling of greenhouse gas concentrations over the next century,
we estimate that the extent of Antarctic sea ice would decrease by about one third, says
John Turner, a climatologist with the British Antarctic Survey. Earlier this year the emperor
penguin was added to the IUCN’s Red List for species threatened with extinction in the near
future-“near” meaning in a century or two. When Jenouvrier’s team used the observations at
Dumont d’Urville to predict what will happen as the continent warms, they concluded that the
colony is likely to decline by 81 per cent by 2100 and be heading towards extinction.
I
That is in line with a 2010 study by a team including Jenouvrier and David Ainley of the
California-based ecological consultants H. T. Harvey and Associates. It predicted that all
emperor colonies north of 70 degrees latitude- about 35 percent of the total population-
would decline or disappear if the world warms by 2℃, although a few colonies south of 73
degrees might grow a little. This might not sound too bad, but both these studies are based
on what increasingly appear to be overly optimistic assumptions. If we continue as we are,
the global temperature will climb above 2℃ before 2050, on course to a 5 or 6℃ rise by
2100. “If the earth warms by 5 or 6 degrees, I can’t see that there’s going to be much sea
ice left anywhere on Earth,” says Ainley. And if the sea ice vanishes, the emperor penguins
will vanish too.
Questions 1-6
Use the information in the passage to match the people (listed A-E) with opinions or deeds
below.
Write the appropriate letters A-E in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
A Stephanie Jenouvrier
B Gerald Kooyman
C Phil Trathan
D David Ainley
E John Turner
1 Penguin breeding is threatened by sea ice melting in advance.
2 About 30% sea ice would disappear in the future.
3 Penguin needs constant sea ice for feather changing.
4 Dead chicks are easy to be counted after a storm.
5 No sea ice left in case global temperature increased certain degrees.
6 Sea ice provides foundation for Antarctic ecology.
Questions 7-10
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 7-10 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
7 It is the female emperor penguin that carried more incubation duty.
8 Evangelical Christian lives a similar lifestyle as penguin.
9 With the advanced satellite photographs, fluctuation of penguin number is easily
observed.
10 Strong winds caused by Ozone depletion, blow away the sea ice.
Questions 11-13
Summary
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE
THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 11-13 on your answer sheet.
There are several reasons of why emperor penguins are vulnerable to sea ice
transformation. First of all, they are not 11 _________ to walk on steep rocks that all over
Antarctica. They wouldn’t be able to breed. Next, emperors need to 12 _________ at certain
time of year, which protects them from been killed by freezing water. Finally, emperor
penguin’s food called 13 _________ is also connected to availability of sea ice.
READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
Water Filter
A
An ingenious invention is set to bring clean water to the third world, and while the science
may be cutting edge, the materials are extremely down to earth. A handful of clay
yesterday’s coffee grounds and some cow manure are the ingredients that could bring
clean, safe drinking water to much of the third world.
B
The simple new technology, developed by ANU materials scientist Mr. Tony Flynn, allows
water filters to be made from commonly available materials and fired on the ground using
cow manure as the source of heat, without the need for a kiln. The filters have been tested
and shown to remove common pathogens (disease-producing organisms) including E-coli.
Unlike other water filtering devices, the filters are simple and inexpensive to make. “They
are very simple to explain and demonstrate and can be made by anyone, anywhere,” says
Mr. Flynn. “They don’t require any western technology. All you need is terracotta clay, a
compliant cow and a match.”
C
The production of the filters is extremely simple. Take a handful of dry, crushed clay, mix it
with a handful of organic material, such as used tea leaves, coffee grounds or rice hulls, add
enough water to make a stiff biscuit-like mixture and form a cylindrical pot that has one end
closed, then dry it in the sun. According to Mr. Flynn, used coffee grounds have given the
best results to date. Next, surround the pots with straw; put them in a mound of cow
manure, light the straw and then top up the burning manure as required. In less than 60
minutes the filters are finished. The walls of the finished pot should be about as thick as an
adult’s index. The properties of cow manure are vital as the fuel can reach a temperature of
700 degrees in half an hour and will be up to 950 degrees after another 20 to 30 minutes.
The manure makes a good fuel because it is very high in organic material that bums readily
and quickly; the manure has to be dry and is best used exactly as found in the field, there is
no need to break it up or process it any further.
D
“A potter’s din is an expensive item and can take up to four or five hours to get up to 800
degrees. It needs expensive or scarce fuel, such as gas or wood to heat it and experience to
run it. With no technology, no insulation and nothing other than a pile of cow manure and a
match, none of these restrictions apply,” Mr. Flynn says.
E
It is also helpful that, like terracotta clay and organic material, cow dung is freely available
across the developing world. “A cow is a natural fuel factory. My understanding is that cow
dung as a fuel would be pretty much the same wherever you would find it.” Just as using
manure as a fuel for domestic uses is not a new idea, the porosity of clay is something that
potters have known about for years, and something that as a former ceramics lecturer in the
ANU School of Art, Mr. Flynn is well aware of. The difference is that rather than viewing the
porous nature of the material as a problem — after all not many people want a pot that won’t
hold water — his filters capitalize on this property.
F
Other commercial ceramic filters do exist, but, even if available, with prices starting at US$5
each, they are often outside the budgets of most people in the developing world. The
filtration process is simple, but effective. The basic principle is that there are passages
through the filter that are wide enough for water droplets to pass through, but too narrow for
pathogens. Tests with the deadly E-coli bacterium have seen the filters remove 96.4 to 99.8
per cent of the pathogen — well within safe levels. Using only one filter it takes two hours to
filter a litre of water. The use of organic material, which burns away after firing, helps
produce the structure in which pathogens will become trapped. It overcomes the potential
problems of finer clays that may not let water through and also means that cracks are soon
halted. And like clay and cow dung, it is universally available.
G
The invention was born out of a World Vision project involving the Manatuto community in
East Timor The charity wanted to help set up a small industry manufacturing water filters,
but initial research found the local clay to be too fine — a problem solved by the addition of
organic material. While the AF problems of producing a working ceramic filter in East Timor
were overcome, the solution was kiln-based and particular to that community’s materials
and couldn’t be applied elsewhere. Manure firing, with no requirement for a kiln, has made
this zero technology approach available anywhere it is needed. With all the components
being widely available, Mr. Flynn says there is no reason the technology couldn’t be applied
throughout the developing world, and with no plans to patent his idea, there will be no legal
obstacles to it being adopted in any community that needs it. “Everyone has a right to clean
water, these filters have the potential to enable anyone in the world to drink water safely,”
says Mr. Flynn.
Questions 14-19
Complete the flow chart, using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage
for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 14-19 on your answer sheet.
Guide to Making Water Filters
Step one: combination of 14________ and organic material, with sufficient 15________ to
create a thick mixture
↓
sun dried
Step two: pack 16________ around the cylinders
Place them in 17________ which is as burning fuel
↓
for firing (maximum temperature: 18________)
filter being baked in under 19________
Questions 20-23
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 20-23 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
20 It takes half an hour for the manure to reach 950 degrees.
21 Clay was initially found to be unsuitable for filter making.
22 Coffee grounds are twice as effective as other materials.
23 E-coli is the most difficult bacteria to combat.
Questions 24-26
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
Write your answers in boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet.
24 When making the pot, the thickness of the wall
A is large enough to let the pathogens to pass.
B varied according to the temperature of the fuel.
C should be the same as an adult’s forefinger.
D is not mentioned by Mr. Flynn.
25 What is true about the charity, it
A failed in searching the appropriate materials.
B thought a kiln is essential.
C found that the local clay are good enough.
D intended to build a filter production factory.
26 Mr. Flynn’s design is purposed not being patented
A because he hopes it can be freely used around the world
B because he doesn’t think the technology is perfect enough
C because there are some legal obstacles
D because the design has already been applied thoroughly
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Roller Coaster
A
600 years ago, roller coaster pioneers never would have imagined the advancements that
have been made to create the roller coasters of today. The tallest and fastest roller coaster
in the world is the Kingda Ka, a coaster in New Jersey that launches its passengers from
zero to 128 miles per hour in 3.5 seconds. It then heaves its riders skyward at a 90-degree
angle (straight up) until it reaches a height of 456 feet, over one and a half football fields,
above the ground, before dropping another 418 feet. With that said, roller coasters are about
more than just speed and height, they are about the creativity of the designers that build
them, each coaster having its own unique way of producing intense thrills at a lesser risk
than the average car ride. Roller coasters have evolved drastically over the years, from their
primitive beginnings as Russian ice slides, to the metal monsters of today. Their
combination of creativity and structural elements make them one of the purest forms of
architecture.
B
At first glance, a roller coaster is something like a passenger train. It consists of a series of
connected cars that move on tracks. But unlike a passenger train, a roller coaster has no
engine or power source of its own. For most of the ride, the train is moved by gravity and
momentum. To build up this momentum, you need to get the train to the top of the first hill or
give it a powerful launch. The traditional lifting mechanism is a long length of chain running
up the hill under the track. The chain is fastened in a loop, which is wound around a gear at
the top of the hill and another one at the bottom of the hill. The gear at the bottom of the hill
is turned by a simple motor. This turns the chain loop so that it continually moves up the hill
like a long conveyer belt. The coaster cars grip onto the chain with several chain dogs,
sturdy hinged hooks. When the train rolls to the bottom of the hill, the dogs catches onto the
chain links. Once the chain dog is hooked, the chain simply pulls the train to the top of the
hill. At the summit, the chain dog is released and the train starts its descent down the hill.
C
Roller coasters have a long, fascinating history. The direct ancestors of roller coasters were
monumental ice slides – long, steep wooden slides covered in ice, some as high as 70 feet
– that were popular in Russia in the 16th and 17th centuries. Riders shot down the slope in
sleds made out of wood or blocks of ice, crash-landing in a sand pile. Coaster historians
diverge on the exact evolution of these ice slides into actual rolling carts. The most
widespread account is that a few entrepreneurial Frenchmen imported the ice slide idea to
France. The warmer climate of France tended to melt the ice, so the French started building
waxed slides instead, eventually adding wheels to the sleds. In 1817, the Russes a Belleville
(Russian Mountains of Belleville) became the first roller coaster where the train was
attached to the track (in this case, the train axle fit into a carved groove). The French
continued to expand on this idea, coming up with more complex track layouts, with multiple
cars and all sorts of twists and turns.
D
In comparison to the world’s first roller coaster, there is perhaps an even greater debate
over what was America’s first true coaster. Many will say that it is Pennsylvania’s own
Maunch Chunk-Summit Hill and Switch Back Railroad. The Maunch Chunk Summit Hill and
Switch Back Railroad was originally America’s second railroad, and considered by many to
be the greatest coaster of all time. Located in the Lehigh valley, it was originally used to
transport coal from the top of Mount Pisgah to the bottom of Mount Jefferson, until Josiah
White, a mining entrepreneur, had the idea of turning it into a part-time thrill ride. Because of
its immediate popularity, it soon became strictly a passenger train. A steam engine would
haul passengers to the top of the mountain, before letting them coast back down, with
speeds rumored to reach 100 miles per hour! The reason that it was called a switch back
railroad, a switch back track was located at the top – where the steam engine would let the
riders coast back down. This type of track featured a dead end where the steam engine
would detach its cars, allowing riders to coast down backwards. The railway went through a
couple of minor track changes and name changes over the years, but managed to last from
1829 to 1937, over 100 years.
E
The coaster craze in America was just starting to build. The creation of the Switch Back
Railway, by La Marcus Thompson, gave roller coasters national attention. Originally built at
New York’s Coney Island in 1884, Switch Back Railways began popping up all over the
country. The popularity of these rides may puzzle the modern-day thrill seeker, due to the
mild ride they gave in comparison to the modern-day roller coaster. Guests would pay a
nickel to wait in line up to five hours just to go down a pair of side-by-side tracks with
gradual hills that vehicles coasted down at a top speed around six miles per hour.
Regardless, Switchback Railways were very popular, and sparked many people, including
Thompson, to design coasters that were bigger and better.
F
The 1910s and 1920s were probably the best decade that the roller coaster has ever seen.
The new wave of technology, such as the “unstop wheels”, an arrangement that kept a
coaster’s wheels to its tracks by resisted high gravitational forces, showed coasters a realm
of possibilities that has never been seen before. In 1919, North America alone had about
1,500 roller coasters, a number that was rising rampantly. Then, the Great Depression gave
a crushing blow to amusement parks all over America. As bad as it was, amusement parks
had an optimistic look on the future in the late 1930s. But, in 1942 roller coasters could
already feel the effects of World War Two, as they were forced into a shadow of neglect.
Most, nearly all of America’s roller coasters were shut down. To this very day, the number of
roller coaster in America is just a very tiny fraction of the amount of roller coasters in the
1920s.
Questions 27-30
Answer the questions below.
A diagram that explains the mechanism and working principles of roller coaster.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each
answer.
Traditional lifting mechanism

(1) Traditional roller coaster’s lifting force depends on a long time of 27 _______ for climbing
up, which is connected firmly to a 28 _______ shape track
(2) there are both 29 _______ on the top and underneath the hill and it is powered by
a 30 _______ when it takes a turn.
Questions 31-36
Summary
Complete the following summary of the paragraphs of Reading Passage, using NO MORE
THAN TWO WORDS from the Reading Passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 31-35 on your answer sheet.
The first roller coaster was perhaps originated from Russia which is wrapped up
by 31 _______, which was introduced into France, and it was modified to 32 _______,
because temperature there would 33 _______ the ice. This time 34 _______were installed
on the board.
In America, the first roller coaster was said to appear in Pennsylvania, it was actually a
railroad which was designed to send 35 _______ between two mountains. Josiah White
turned it into a thrill ride, it was also called switch back track and a 36 _______ there
allowed riders to slide downward back again.
Questions 37-40
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement is true
NO if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
37 The most exiting roller coaster in the world is in New Jersey.
38 French added more innovation on Russian ice slide including both cars and tracks.
39 Switch Back Railways began to gain popularity since its first construction in New York.
40 The Great Depression affected amusement parks yet did not shake the significant role
of US roller coasters in the world.
 IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 32 with Answer
READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
Koalas
A
Koalas are just too nice for their own good. And except for the occasional baby taken by
birds of prey, koalas have no natural enemies. In an ideal world, the life of an arboreal
couch potato would be perfectly safe and acceptable.
B
Just two hundred years ago, koalas flourished across Australia. Now they seem to be in
decline, but exact numbers are not available as the species would not seem to be ‘under
threat’. Their problem, however, has been man, more specifically, the white man. Koala and
aborigine had co-existed peacefully for centuries.
C
Today koalas are found only in scattered pockets of southeast Australia, where they seem
to be at risk on several fronts. The koala’s only food source, the eucalyptus tree has
declined. In the past 200 years, a third of Australia’s eucalyptus forests have disappeared.
Koalas have been killed by parasites, chlamydia epidemics and a tumour-causing retro-
virus. And every year 11000 are killed by cars, ironically most of them in wildlife sanctuaries,
and thousands are killed by poachers. Some are also taken illegally as pets. The animals
usually soon die, but they are easily replaced.
D
Bush fires pose another threat. The horrific ones that raged in New South Wales recently
killed between 100 and 1000 koalas. Many that were taken into sanctuaries and shelters
were found to have burnt their paws on the glowing embers. But zoologists say that the
species should recover. The koalas will be aided by the eucalyptus, which grows quickly and
is already burgeoning forth after the fires. So the main problem to their survival is their slow
reproductive rate – they produce only one baby a year over a reproductive lifespan of about
nine years.
E
The latest problem for the species is perhaps more insidious. With plush, grey fur, dark
amber eyes and button nose, koalas are cuddliness incarnate. Australian zoos and wildlife
parks have taken advantage of their uncomplaining attitudes, and charge visitors to be
photographed hugging the furry bundles. But people may not realise how cruel this is, but
because of the koala’s delicate disposition, constant handling can push an already
precariously balanced physiology over the edge.
F
Koalas only eat the foliage of certain species of eucalyptus trees, between 600 and 1250
grams a day. The tough leaves are packed with cellulose, tannins, aromatic oils and
precursors of toxic cyanides. To handle this cocktail, koalas have a specialised digestive
system. Cellulose- digesting bacteria in the break down fibre, while a specially adapted gut
and liver process the toxins. To digest their food properly, koalas must sit still for 21 hours
every day.
G
Koalas are the epitome of innocence and inoffensiveness. Although they are capable of
ripping open a man’s arm with their needle-sharp claws, or giving a nasty nip, they simply
wouldn’t. If you upset a koala, it may blink or swallow, or hiccup. But attack? No way! Koalas
are just not aggressive. They use their claws to grip the hard smooth bark of eucalyptus
trees.
H
They are also very sensitive, and the slightest upset can prevent them from breeding, cause
them to go off their food, and succumb to gut infections. Koalas are stoic creatures and put
on a brave face until they are at death’s door. One day they may appear healthy, the next
they could be dead. Captive koalas have to be weighed daily to check that they are feeding
properly. A sudden loss of weight is usually the only warning keepers have that their charge
is ill. Only two keepers plus a vet were allowed to handle London Zoo’s koalas, as these
creatures are only comfortable with people they know. A request for the koala to be taken to
meet the Queen was refused because of the distress this would have caused the marsupial.
Sadly, London’s Zoo no longer has a koala. Two years ago the female koala died of a
cancer caused by a retrovirus. When they come into heat, female koalas become more
active, and start losing weight, but after about sixteen days, heat ends and the weight piles
back on. London’s koala did not. Surgery revealed hundreds of pea-sized tumours.
Almost every zoo in Australia has koalas – the marsupial has become the Animal
Ambassador of the nation, but nowhere outside Australia would handling by the public be
allowed. Koala cuddling screams in the face of every rule of good care. First, some zoos
allow koalas to be passed from stranger to stranger, many children who love to squeeze.
Secondly, most people have no idea of how to handle the animals; they like to cling on to
their handler, all in their own good time and use his or her arm as a tree. For such reasons,
the Association of Fauna and Marine parks, an Australian conservation society is
campaigning to ban koala cuddling. Policy on koala handling is determined by state
government authorities. “And the largest of the numbers in the Australian Nature
Conservation Agency, with the aim of instituting national guidelines. Following a wave of
publicity, some zoos and wildlife parks have stopped turning their koalas into photo.
Questions 1-5
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
Write the correct letter in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.
1 The main reason why koala declined is that they are killed EXCEPT FOR
A by poachers
B by diseases they got
C giving too many birth yet survived little!
D accidents on the road
2 What can help koalas folly digest their food?
A toxic substance in the leaves
B organs that dissolve the fibres
C remaining inactive for a period to digest
D eating eucalyptus trees
3 What would koalas do when facing the dangerous situation?
A show signs of being offended
B counter attack furiously
C use sharp claws to rip the man
D use claws to grip the bark of trees.
4 In what ways Australian zoos exploit koalas?
A encourage people to breed koalas as pets
B allow tourists to hug the koalas
C put them on the trees as a symbol
D establish a koala campaign
5 What would the government do to protect koalas from being endangered?
A introduce koala protection guidelines
B close some of the zoos
C encourage people to resist visiting the zoos
D persuade the public to learn more knowledge
Questions 6-12
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 6-12 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement agrees with the information
NO if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this passage
6 new coming human settlers caused danger to koalas.
7 Koalas can still be seen in most of the places in Australia.
8 it takes decade for the eucalyptus trees to recover after the fire.
9 Koalas will fight each other when food becomes scarce.
10 It is not easy to notice that koalas are ill.
11 Koalas are easily infected with human contagious disease via cuddling
12 Koalas like to hold a person’s arm when they are embraced.
Question 13
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
Write the correct letter in box 13 on your answer sheet.
From your opinion this article written by
A a journalist who write for magazine
B a zoo keeper in London Zoo.
C a tourist who traveling back from Australia
D a government official who studies koalas to establish a law
READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
The Conquest of Malaria in Italy, 1900-1962
Mal-aria. Bad air. Even the world is Italian, and this horrible disease marked the life of those
in the peninsula for thousands of years. Yet by 1962, Italy was officially declared malaria-
free, and it has remained so ever since. Frank Snowden’s study of this success story takes
us to areas historians have rarely visited before.
A
Everybody now knows that malaria is carried by mosquitoes. But in the 19th century, most
experts believed that the disease was produced by “miasma” or “poisoning of the air”.
Others made a link between swamps, water and malaria, but did not make the future leap
towards insects. The consequences of these theories were that little was done to combat
the disease before the end of the century. Things became so bad that 11m Italians (from a
total population of 25m) were “permanently at risk”. In malarial zones the life expectancy of
land workers was a terrifying 22.5 years. Those who escaped death were weakened or
suffered from splenomegaly –a “painful enlargement of the spleen” and “a lifeless stare”.
The economic impact of the disease was immense. Epidemics were blamed on southern
Italians, given the widespread belief that malaria was hereditary. In the 1880s, such theories
began to collapse as the dreaded mosquito was identified as the real culprit.
B
Italian scientists, drawing on the pioneering work of French doctor Alphonse Laveran, were
able to predict the cycles of fever but it was in Rome that further key discoveries were made.
Giovanni Battista Grassi, a naturalist, found that a particular type of mosquito was the carrier
of malaria. By experimenting on healthy volunteers (mosquitoes were released into rooms
where they drank the blood of the human guinea pigs), Grassi was able to make the direct
link between the insects (all females of a certain kind) and the disease. Soon, doctors and
scientists made another startling discovery: the mosquitoes themselves were also infected
and not mere carriers. Every year, during the mosquito season, malarial blood was moved
around the population by the insects. Definitive proof of these new theories was obtained
after an extraordinary series of experiments in Italy, where healthy people were introduced
into malarial zones but kept free of mosquito bites –and remained well. The new Italian state
had the necessary information to tackle the disease.
C
A complicated approach was adopted, which made use of quinine –a drug obtained from
tree bark which had long been used to combat fever, but was now seen as a crucial part of
the war on malaria. Italy introduced a quinine law and a quinine tax in 1904, and the drug
was administered to large numbers of rural workers. Despite its often terrible side-effects
(the headaches produced were known as the “quinine-buzz”) the drug was successful in
limiting the spread of the disease, and in breaking cycles of infection. In addition, Italy set up
rural health centres and invested heavily in education programmes. Malaria, as Snowden
shows, was not just a medical problem, but a social and regional issue, and could only be
defeated through multilayered strategies. Politics was itself transformed by the anti-malarial
campaigns. It was originally decided to give quinine to all those in certain regions – even
healthy people; peasants were often suspicious of medicine being forced upon them.
Doctors were sometimes met with hostility and refusal, and many were dubbed “poisoners”.
D
Despite these problems, the strategy was hugely successful. Deaths from malaria fell by
some 80% in the first decade of the 20th century and some areas escaped altogether from
the scourge of the disease. War, from 1915-18, delayed the campaign. Funds were diverted
to the battlefields and the fight against malaria became a military issue, laying the way for
the fascist approach to the problem. Mussolini’s policies in the 20s and 30s subjected to a
serious cross-examination by Snowden. He shows how much of the regime’s claims to have
“eradicated” malaria through massive land reclamation, forced population removals and
authoritarian clean-ups were pure propaganda. Mass draining was instituted –often at a
great cost as Mussolini waged war not on the disease itself, but on the mosquitoes that
carried it. The cleansing of Italy was also ethnic, as “carefully selected” Italians were chosen
to inhabit the gleaming new towns of the former marshlands around Rome. The “successes”
under fascism were extremely vulnerable, based as they were on a top-down concept of
eradication. As war swept through the drained lands in the 40s, the disease returned with a
vengeance.
E
In the most shocking part of the book, Snowden describes –passionately, but with the skill of
a great historian –how the retreating Nazi armies in Italy in 1934- 44 deliberately caused a
massive malaria epidemic in Lazio. It was “the only known example of biological warfare in
20th century Europe”. Shamefully, the Italian malaria expert Alberto Missiroli had a role to
play in the disaster: he did not distribute quinine, despite being well aware of the epidemic to
come. Snowden claims that Missiroli was already preparing a new strategy –with the
support of the US Rockefeller Foundation-using a new pesticide, DDT. Missiroli allowed the
epidemic to spread, in order to create the ideal conditions for a massive, a lucrative, human
experiment. Fifty-five thousand cases of malaria were recorded in the province of Littoria
alone in 1944. It is estimated that more than a third of those in the affected area contracted
the disease. Thousands, nobody knows how many, died. With the war over, the US
government and the Rockefeller Foundation were free to experiment. DDT was sprayed
from the air and 3m Italians had their bodies covered with the chemical. The effects were
dramatic, and nobody really cared about the toxic effects of the chemical.
F
By 1962, malaria was more or less gone from the whole peninsula. The last cases were
noted in a poor region of Sicily. One of the final victims to die of the disease in Italy was the
popular cyclist, Fausto Coppi. He had contracted malaria in Africa in 1960, and the failure of
doctors in the north of Italy to spot the disease was a sign of the times. A few decades
earlier, they would have immediately noticed the tell-tale signs; it was later claimed that a
small dose of quinine would have saved his life. As there are still more than 1m deaths
every year from malaria worldwide, Snowden’s book also has contemporary relevance. This
is a disease that affects every level of the societies where it is rampant. It also provides us
with “a message of hope for a world struggling with the great present-day medical
emergency”.
Questions 14-18
Complete the summary below using NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage.
Write your answer in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.
Before the link between malaria and 14 ________ was established, there were many
popular theories circulating among the public, one of which points to 15 ________, the
unclean air. The lack of proper treatment affected the country so badly that rural people in
malaria infested places had extremely short 16 ________. The disease spread so quickly,
especially in the south of Italy, thus giving rise to the idea that the disease was 17________.
People believed in these theories until mosquito was found to be the 18 ________ in the
1880s.
Questions 19-21
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 19-21 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
19 The volunteers of the Italian experiments that provided assuring evidence were from all
over Italy.
20 It’s possible to come out of malarial zones alive.
21 The government successfully managed to give all people quinine medication.
Question 22-26
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 22-26 on your answer sheet.
22 A breakthrough in the theory of the cause of malaria
23 A story for today’s readers
24 A description of an expert who didn’t do anything to restrict the spread of disease
25 A setback in the battle against malaria due to government policies
26 A description of how malaria affects the human body
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Inspired by Mimicking Mother Nature
Using the environment not as an exploitable resource, but as a source of inspiration
A
Researchers and designers around the globe endeavor to create new technologies that, by
honoring the tenets of life, are both highly efficient and often environmentally friendly. And
while biomimicry is not a new concept (Leonardo da Vinci looked to nature to design his
flying machines, for example, and pharmaceutical companies have long been miming plant
organisms in synthetic drugs), there is a greater need for products and manufacturing
processes that use a minimum of energy, materials, and toxins. What’s more, due to
technological advancements and a newfound spirit of innovation among designers, there are
now myriad ways to mimic Mother Nature’s best assets.
B
“We have a perfect storm happening right now,” says Jay Harman, an inventor and CEO of
PAX Scientific, which designs fans, mixers, and pumps to achieve maximum efficiency by
imitating the natural flow of fluids. “Shapes in nature are extremely simple once you
understand them, but to understand what geometries are at play, and to adapt them, is a
very complex process. We only just recently have had the computer power and
manufacturing capability to produce these types of shapes.” “If we could capture nature’s
efficiencies across the board, we could decrease dependency on fuel by at least 50
percent,” Harman says. “What we’re finding already with the tools and methodology we have
right now is that we can reduce energy consumption by between 30 and 40 percent.”
C
It’s only recently that mainstream companies have begun to equate biomimicry with the
bottom line. DaimlerChrysler, for example, introduced a prototype car modeled on a coral
reef fish. Despite its boxy, cube-shaped body, which defies a long-held aerodynamic
standard in automotive design (the raindrop shape), the streamlined boxfish proved to be
aerodynamically ideal and the unique construction of its skin—numerous hexagonal, bony
plates—a perfect recipe for designing a car of maximum strength with minimal weight.
D
Companies and communities are flocking to Janine Benyus, author of the landmark book
Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature (Perennial, 2002) and cofounder of the
Biomimicry Guild, which seats biologists at the table with researchers and designers at
companies such as Nike, Interface carpets, Novell, and Procter & Gamble. Their objective is
to marry industrial problems with natural solutions.
E
Benyus, who hopes companies will ultimately transcend mere product design to embrace
nature on a more holistic level, breaks biomimicry into three tiers. On a basic (albeit
complicated) level, industry will mimic nature’s precise and efficient shapes, structures, and
geometries. The microstructure of the lotus leaf, for example, causes raindrops to bead and
run off immediately, while self-cleaning and drying its surface—a discovery that the British
paint company Sto has exploited in a line of building paints. The layered structure of a
butterfly wing or a peacock plume, which creates iridescent color by refracting light, is being
mimicked by cosmetics giant L’Oreal in a soon-to-be-released line of eye shadow, lipstick,
and nail varnish.
F
The next level of biomimicry involves imitating natural processes and biochemical “recipes”:
Engineers and scientists are now looking at the nasal glands of seabirds to solve the
problem of desalination; the abalone’s ability to self-assemble its incredibly durable shell in
water, using local ingredients, has inspired an alternative to the conventional, and often
toxic, “heat, beat, and treat” manufacturing method. How other organisms deal with harmful
bacteria can also be instructive: Researchers for the Australian company Biosignal, for
instance, observed a seaweed that lives in an environment teeming with microbes to figure
out how it kept free of the same sorts of bacterial colonies, called biofilms, that cause plaque
on your teeth and clog up your bathroom drain. They determined that the seaweed uses
natural chemicals, called furanones, that jam the cell-to-cell signaling systems that allow
bacteria to communicate and gather.
G
Ultimately, the most sophisticated application of biomimicry, according to Benyus, is when a
company starts seeing itself as an organism in an economic ecosystem that must make
thrifty use of limited resources and creates symbiotic relationships with other organisms. A
boardroom approach at this level begins with imagining any given company, or collection of
industries, as a forest, prairie, or coral reef, with its own “food web”(manufacturing inputs
and outputs) and asking whether waste products from one manufacturing process can be
used, or perhaps sold, as an ingredient for another industrial activity. For instance, Geoffrey
Coates, a chemist at Cornell, has developed a biodegradable plastic synthesized from
carbon dioxide and limonene (a major component in the oil extracted from citrus rind) and is
working with a cement factory to trap their waste CO2 and use it as an ingredient.
H
Zero Emissions Research and Initiatives (ZERI), a global network of scientists,
entrepreneurs, and educators, has initiated eco-industrial projects that attempt to find ways
to reuse all wastes as raw materials for other processes. Storm Brewing in Newfoundland,
Canada—in one of a growing number of projects around the world applying ZERI principles
—is using spent grains, a by-product of the beer-making process, to make bread and grow
mushrooms.
As industries continue to adopt nature’s models, entire manufacturing processes could
operate locally, with local ingredients like the factories that use liquefied beach sand to
make windshields. As more scientists and engineers begin to embrace biomimicry, natural
organisms will come to be regarded as mentors, their processes deemed masterful.
Questions 27-32
Look at the following descriptions mentioned in Reading Passage 3.
Match the three kinds of levels (A-C) listed below the descriptions.
Write the appropriate letters, A-C, in boxes 27-32 on your answer sheet.
A First level: mimic nature’s precise and efficient shapes, structures, and geometries
B Second level: imitating natural processes and biochemical ‘recipes’
C Third level: creates symbiotic relationships with other like organisms
27 Synthesized Plastic, developed together with cement factory, can recycle waste gas.
28 Cosmetics companies produce a series of shine cosmetics colours
29 People are inspired how to remove excess salt inspired by nature.
30 Daimler Chrysler introduced a fish-shaped car.
31 Marine plan company integrated itself into a part in economic ecosystem
32 natural chemicals developed based on seaweed known to kill bacteria
Questions 33-40
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 33-40 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement is true
NO if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
33 Biomimicry is a totally new concept that has been unveiled recently.
34 Leonardo da Vinci has been the first designer to mimic nature
35 Scientists believe it involves more than mimicking the shape to capture the design in
nature
36 We can save the utilisation of energy by up to 40% if we take advantage of the current
findings.
37 Daimler Chrysler’s prototype car modelled on a coral reef fish is a best-seller.
38 Some great companies and communities themselves are seeking solutions beyond their
own industrial scope
39 The British paint company Sto did not make the microstructure of the lotus leaf,
applicable
40 a Canadian beer Company increased the production by applying ZERI principles
IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 01 with Answer
READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
The Concept of Childhood in Western Countries
The history of childhood has been a heated topic in social history since the highly influential
book Centuries of Childhood’, written by French historian Philippe Aries, emerged in 1960.
He claimed that ‘childhood’ is a concept created by modern society.
Whether childhood is itself a recent invention has been one of the most intensely debated
issues in the history of childhood. Historian Philippe Aries asserted that children were
regarded as miniature adults, with all the intellect and personality that this implies, in
Western Europe during the Middle Ages (up to about the end of the 15th century). After
scrutinising medieval pictures and diaries, he concluded that there was no distinction
between children and adults for they shared similar leisure activities and work; However, this
does not mean children were neglected, forsaken or despised, he argued. The idea of
childhood corresponds to awareness about the peculiar nature of childhood, which
distinguishes the child from adult, even the young adult. Therefore, the concept of childhood
is not to be confused with affection for children.
Traditionally, children played a functional role in contributing to the family income in the
history. Under this circumstance, children were considered to be useful. Back in the Middle
Ages, children of 5 or 6 years old did necessary chores for their parents. During the 16th
century, children of 9 or 10 years old were often encouraged or even forced to leave their
family to work as servants for wealthier families or apprentices for a trade.
In the 18th and 19th centuries, industrialisation created a new demand for child labour; thus
many children were forced to work for a long time in mines, workshops and factories. The
issue of whether long hours of labouring would interfere with children’s growing bodies
began to perplex social reformers. Some of them started to realise the potential of
systematic studies to monitor how far these early deprivations might be influencing
children’s development.
The concerns of reformers gradually had some impact upon the working condition of
children. For example, in Britain, the Factory Act of 1833 signified the emergence of legal
protection of children from exploitation and was also associated with the rise of schools for
factory children. Due partly to factory reform, the worst forms of child exploitation were
eliminated gradually. The influence of trade unions and economic changes also contributed
to the evolution by leaving some forms of child labour redundant during the 19th century.
Initiating children into work as ‘useful’ children was no longer a priority, and childhood was
deemed to be a time for play and education for all children instead of a privileged minority.
Childhood was increasingly understood as a more extended phase of dependency,
development and learning with the delay of the age for starting full-time work- Even so, work
continued to play a significant, if less essential, role in children’s lives in the later 19th and
20th centuries. Finally, the ‘useful child’ has become a controversial concept during the first
decade of the 21st century, especially in the context of global concern about large numbers
of children engaged in child labour.
The half-time schools established upon the Factory Act of 1833 allowed children to work and
attend school. However, a significant proportion of children never attended school in the
1840s, and even if they did, they dropped out by the age of 10 or 11. By the end of the 19th
century in Britain, the situation changed dramatically, and schools became the core to the
concept of a ‘normal’ childhood.
It is no longer a privilege for children to attend school and all children are expected to spend
a significant part of their day in a classroom. Once in school, children’s lives could be
separated from domestic life and the adult world of work. In this way, school turns into an
institution dedicated to shaping the minds, behaviour and morals of the young. Besides,
education dominated the management of children’s waking hours through the hours spent in
the classroom, homework (the growth of ‘after school’ activities), and the importance
attached to parental involvement.
Industrialisation, urbanisation and mass schooling pose new challenges for those who are
responsible for protecting children’s welfare, as well as promoting their learning. An
increasing number of children are being treated as a group with unique needs, and are
organised into groups in the light of their age. For instance, teachers need to know some
information about what to expect of children in their classrooms, what kinds of instruction
are appropriate for different age groups, and what is the best way to assess children’s
progress. Also, they want tools enabling them to sort and select children according to their
abilities and potential.
Questions 1-7
Do the following statements agree with the information give in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 1-7 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
1 Aries pointed out that children did different types of work to adults during the Middle
Ages.
2 Working children during the Middle Ages were generally unloved.
3 Some scientists thought that overwork might damage the health of young children.
4 The rise of trade unions majorly contributed to the protection of children from exploitation
in the 19th century.
5 the aid of half-time schools, most children went to school in the mid-19th century.
6 the 20th century, almost all children needed to go to school with a full-time schedule.
7 Nowadays, children’s needs are much differentiated and categorised based on how old
they are.
Questions 8-13
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 8-13 on your answer sheet.
8 What had not become a hot topic until the French historian Philippe Aries’ book caused
great attention?
9 According to Aries, what was the typical image of children in Western Europe during the
Middle Ages?
10 What historical event generated the need for a large number of children to work for a
long time in the 18th and 19th centuries?
11 What bill was enacted to protect children from exploitation in Britain in the 1800s?
12 Which activities were becoming regarded as preferable for almost all children in the
19th century?
13 In what place did children spend the majority of time during their day in school?
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READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-27 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
The Study of Chimpanzee Culture
A
After studying the similarities between chimpanzees and humans for years, researchers
have recognised these resemblances run much deeper than anyone first thought in the
latest decade. For instance, the nut cracking observed in the Tai Forest is not a simple
chimpanzee behaviour, but a separate adaptation found only in that particular part of Africa,
as well as a trait which is considered to be an expression of chimpanzee culture by
biologists. These researchers frequently quote the word ‘culture’ to describe elementary
animal behaviours, like the regional dialects of different species of songbirds, but it turns out
that the rich and varied cultural traditions chimpanzees enjoyed rank secondly in complexity
only to human traditions.
B
During the past two years, the major research group which studies chimpanzees
collaborated unprecedentedly and documented some distinct cultural patterns, ranging from
animals’ use of tools to their forms of communication and social customs. This emerging
picture of chimpanzees affects how human beings ponder upon these amazing creatures.
Also, it alters our conception of human uniqueness and shows us the extraordinary ability of
our ancient ancestors to create cultures.
C
Although we know that Homo sapiens and Pan Troglodytes have coexisted for hundreds of
millennia and their genetic similarities surpass 98 per cent, we still knew next to nothing
about chimpanzee behaviour in the wild until 40 years ago. All this began to change in the
1960s when Toshisada Nishida of Kyoto University in Japan and renowned British
primatologist Jane Goodall launched their studies of wild chimpanzees at two field sites in
Tanzania. (Goodall’s research station at Gombe—the first of its kind—is more famous, but
Nishida’s site at Mahale is the second oldest chimpanzee research site in the world.)
D
During these primary studies, as the chimpanzees became more and more accustomed to
close observation, the remarkable discoveries emerged. Researchers witnessed a variety of
unexpected behaviours, ranging from fashioning and using tools, hunting, meat eating, food
sharing to lethal fights between members of neighbouring communities.
E
In 1973, 13 forms of tool use and 8 social activities which appeared to differ between the
Gombe chimpanzees and chimpanzee species elsewhere were recorded by Goodall. She
speculated that some variations shared what she referred to as a ‘cultural origin’. But what
exactly did Goodall mean by ‘culture’? According to the Oxford Encyclopedic English
Dictionary, culture is defined as ‘the customs. . .and achievements of a particular time or
people.’ The diversity of human cultures extends from technological variations to marriage
rituals, from culinary habits to myths and legends. Of course, animals do not have myths
and legends, but they do share the capacity to pass on behavioural traits from one
generation to another, not through their genes but via learning. From biologists’ view, this is
the fundamental criterion for a cultural trait—something can be learnt by observing the
established skills of others and then passed on to following generations.
F
What are the implications for chimpanzees themselves? We must place a high value upon
the tragic loss of chimpanzees, who are decimated just when finally we are coming to
appreciate these astonishing animals more completely. The population of chimpanzees has
plummeted and continued to fall due to illegal trapping, logging and, most recently, the
bushmeat trade within the past century. The latter is particularly alarming because logging
has driven roadways, which are now used to ship wild animal meat—including chimpanzee
meat to consumers as far afield as Europe, into forests. Such destruction threatens not only
the animals themselves but also a host of fascinatingly different ape cultures.
G
However, the cultural richness of the ape may contribute to its salvation. For example, the
conservation efforts have already altered the attitudes of some local people. After several
organisations showed videotapes illustrating the cognitive prowess of chimpanzees, one
Zairian viewer was heard to exclaim, ‘Ah, this ape is so like me, I can no longer eat him.’
H
How did an international team of chimpanzee experts perform the most comprehensive
survey of the animals ever attempted? Although scientists have been delving into
chimpanzee culture for several decades, sometimes their studies contained a fatal defect.
So far, most attempts to document cultural diversity among chimpanzees have solely relied
upon officially published accounts of the behaviours reported at each research site. But this
approach probably neglects a good deal of cultural variation for three reasons.
I
First, scientists normally don’t publish an extensive list of all the activities they do not see at
a particular location. Yet this is the very information we need to know—which behaviours
were and were not observed at each site. Second, there are many reports describing
chimpanzee behaviours without expressing how common they are; without this information,
we can’t determine whether a particular action was a transient phenomenon or a routine
event that should be considered part of its culture. Finally, researchers’ description of
potentially significant chimpanzee behaviours often lacks sufficient detail, which makes it
difficult for scientists from other spots to report the presence or absence of the activities.
J
To tackle these problems, my colleague and I determined to take a new approach. We
asked field researchers at each site to list all the behaviours which they suspected were
local traditions. With this information, we assembled a comprehensive list of 65 candidates
for cultural behaviours.
K
Then we distributed our list to team leaders at each site. They consulted with their
colleagues and classified each behaviour regarding its occurrence or absence in the
chimpanzee community. The major brackets contained customary behaviour (occurs in most
or all of the able-bodied members of at least one age or sex class, such as all adult males),
habitual (less common than customary but occurs repeatedly in several individuals), present
(observed at the site but not habitual), absent (never seen), and unknown.

Questions 14-18
Reading Passage 2 has eleven paragraphs, A-K.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-K, in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.
14 an approach to research on chimpanzees culture that is only based on official sources
15 mention of a new system designed by two scientists who aim to solve the problem
16 reasons why previous research on ape culture is problematic
17 new classification of data observed or collected
18 an example showing that the tragic outcome of animals leads to an indication of a
change in local people’s attitude in the preservation

Questions 19-23
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 19-23 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
19 The research found that scientists can make chimpanzees possess the same complex
culture as human beings.
20 Humans and apes lived together long time ago and shared most of their genetic
substance.
21 Even Toshisada Nishida and Jane Goodall’s beginning studies observed many
surprising features of civilised behaviours among chimpanzees.
22 Chimpanzees, like humans, have the ability to deliver cultural behaviours mostly from
genetic inheritance.
23 For decades, researchers have investigated chimpanzees by data obtained from both
unobserved and observed approaches.
Questions 24-27
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each
answer.
Write your answers in boxes 24-27 on your answer sheet.
24 When did the unexpected discoveries of chimpanzee behaviour start?
25 Which country is the researching site of Toshisada Nishida and Jane Goodall?
26 What did the chimpanzee have to get used to in the initial study?
27 What term can be used to depict that Jane Goodall found the chimpanzees in different
regions used the different tools in 1973?
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Texting the Television
A
Once upon a time, if a television show with any self-respect wanted to target a young
audience, it needed to have an e-mail address. However, in Europe’s TV shows, such
addresses are gradually substituted by telephone numbers so that audiences can text the
show from their mobile phones. Therefore, it comes as no shock that according to Gartner’s
research, texting has recently surpassed Internet usage across Europe. Besides, among the
many uses of text messaging, one of the fastest-growing uses is to interact with television.
The statistics provided by Gartner can display that 20% of French teenagers, 11% in Britain
and 9% in Germany have responded to TV programmes by sending a text message.
B
This phenomenon can be largely attributed to the rapid growth of reality TV shows such as
‘Big Brother’, where viewers get to decide the result through voting. The majority of reality
shows are now open to text-message voting, and in some shows like the latest series of
Norway’s ‘Big Brother’, most votes are collected in this manner. But TV-texting isn’t just
about voting. News shows encourage viewers to, comment by texting messages; game
shows enable the audience to be part of the competition; music shows answer requests by
taking text messages; and broadcasters set up on-screen chatrooms. TV audiences tend to
sit on the sofa with their mobile phones right by their sides, and ‘it’s a supernatural way to
interact.’ says Adam Daum of Gartner.
C
Mobile service providers charge appreciable rates for messages to certain numbers, which
is why TV-texting can bring in a lot of cash. Take the latest British series of ‘Big Brother’ as
an example. It brought about 5.4m text-message votes and £1.35m ($2,1m) of profit. In
Germany, MTV’s ‘Videoclash’ encourages the audience to vote for one of two rival videos,
and induces up to 40,000 texts per hour, and each one of those texts costs €0.30 ($0.29),
according to a consultancy based in Amsterdam. The Belgian quiz show ‘1 Against 100’ had
an eight-round texting match on the side, which brought in 110,000 participants in one
month, and each of them paid €0.50 for each question. In Spain, a cryptic-crossword clue
invites the audience to send their answers through text at the expense of €1, so that they
can be enrolled in the poll to win a €300 prize. Normally, 6,000 viewers would participate
within one day.
At the moment, TV-related text messaging takes up a considerable proportion of mobile
service providers’ data revenues. In July, Mm02 (a British operator) reported an
unexpectedly satisfactory result, which could be attributed to the massive text waves
created by ‘Big Brother’. Providers usually own 40%-50% of the profits from each text, and
the rest is divided among the broadcaster, the programme producer and the company which
supplies the message-processing technology. So far, revenues generated from text
messages have been an indispensable part of the business model for various shows.
Obviously, there has been grumbling that the providers take too much of the share.
Endemol, the Netherlands-based production firm that is responsible for many reality TV,
shows including ‘Big Brother’, has begun constructing its own database for mobile-phone
users. It plans to set up a direct billing system with the users and bypass the providers.
D
How come the joining forces of television and text message turn out to be this successful?
One crucial aspect is the emergence of one-of-a-kind four-, five- or six-digit numbers known
as ‘short codes’. Every provider has control over its own short codes, but not until recently
have they come to realise that it would make much more sense to work together to offer
short codes compatible with all networks. The emergence of this universal short codes was
a game-changer, because short codes are much easier to remember on the screen,
according to Lars Becker of Flytxt, a mobile-marketing company.
E
Operators’ co-operation on enlarging the market is by a larger trend, observes Katrina Bond
of Analysys, a consultancy. When challenged by the dilemma between holding on tight to
their margins and permitting the emergence of a new medium, no provider has ever chosen
the latter WAP, a technology for mobile-phone users to read cut-down web pages on their
screens, failed because of service providers’ reluctance towards revenue sharing with
content providers. Now that they’ve learnt their lesson, they are altering the way of
operating. Orange, a French operator, has come such a long way as to launch a rate card
for sharing revenue of text messages, a new level of transparency that used to be
unimaginable.
F
At a recent conference, Han Weegink of CMG, a company that offers the television market
text-message infrastructure, pointed out that the television industry is changing in a subtle
yet fundamental way. Instead of the traditional one-way presentation, more and more TV
shows are now getting viewers’ reactions involved.
Certainly, engaging the audiences more has always been the promise of interactive TV. An
interactive TV was originally designed to work with exquisite set-top devices, which could be
directly plugged into the TV. However, as Mr Daum points out, that method was flawed in
many ways. Developing and testing software for multiple and incompatible types of set-top
box could be costly, not to mention that the 40% (or lower) market penetration is below that
of mobile phones (around 85%). What’s more, it’s quicker to develop and set up apps for
mobile phones. ‘You can approach the market quicker, and you don’t have to go through as
many greedy middlemen,’ Mr Daum says. Providers of set-top box technology are now
adding texting function to the design of their products.
G
The triumph of TV-related texting reminds everyone in the business of how easily a fancy
technology can all of a sudden be replaced by a less complicated, lower-tech method. That
being said, the old-fashioned approach to interactive TV is not necessarily over; at least it
proves that strong demands for interactive services still exist. It appears that the viewers
would sincerely like to do more than simply staring at the TV screen. After all, couch
potatoes would love some thumb exercises.

Questions 28-32
Reading Passage 3 has seven sections, A-G.
Choose the correct heading for sections B-E and G from the list of headings below.
Write the correct number, i-ix, inboxes 28-32 on your answer sheet.
List of Headings
i An application of short codes on the TV screen
ii An overview of a fast-growing business
iii The trend that profitable games are gaining more concerns
iv Why Netherlands takes the leading role
v A new perspective towards sharing the business opportunities
vi Factors relevant to the rapid increase in interactive TV
vii The revenue gains and bonus share
viii The possibility of the complex technology replaced by the simpler ones
ix The mind change of set-top box providers
Example Answer
Section A ii
28 Section B
29 Section C
30 Section D
31 Section E
Example Answer
Section F ix
32 Section G

Questions 33-35
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.
Write the correct letter in boxes 33-35 on your answer sheet.
33 In Europe, a research hints that young audiences spend more money on
A thumbing text messages.
B writing e-mails.
C watching TV programmes.
D talking through mobile phones.
34 What would happen when reality TV shows invite the audience to vote?
A Viewers would get attractive bonus.
B They would be part of the competition.
C Their questions would be replied.
D Their participation could change the result.
35 Interactive TV will change from concentrating on set-top devices to
A increasing their share in the market.
B setting up a modified set-top box.
C building an embedded message platform.
D marching into the European market.

Questions 36-40
Look at the following descriptions (Questions 36-40) and the list of companies below.
Match each description with the correct company, A-F.
Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.
List of Companies
A Flytxt
B Analysys
C Endemol
D CMG
E Mm02
F Gartner
36 offered mobile phone message technology
37 earned considerable amount of money through a famous programme
38 expressed the view that short codes are convenient to remember when turning up
39 built their own mobile phone operating applications
40 indicated that it is easy for people to send message in an interactive TV
IELTS Reading Recent Actual Test 02 with Answer
IELTS Reading Recent Actual Tests with Answers
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READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-14 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 below.
Timekeeper: Invention of Marine Chronometer
A
Up to the middle of the 18th century, the navigators were still unable to exactly identify the
position at sea, so they might face a great number of risks such as the shipwreck or running
out of supplies before arriving at the destination. Knowing one’s position on the earth
requires two simple but essential coordinates, one of which is the longitude.
B
The longitude is a term that can be used to measure the distance that one has covered from
one’s home to another place around the world without the limitations of naturally occurring
baseline like the equator. To determine longitude, navigators had no choice but to measure
the angle with the naval sextant between Moon centre and a specific star— lunar distance—
along with the height of both heavenly bodies. Together with the nautical almanac,
Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) was determined, which could be adopted to calculate
longitude because one hour in GMT means 15-degree longitude. Unfortunately, this
approach laid great reliance on the weather conditions, which brought great inconvenience
to the crew members. Therefore, another method was proposed, that is, the time difference
between the home time and the local time served for the measurement. Theoretically,
knowing the longitude position was quite simple, even for the people in the middle of the sea
with no land in sight. The key element for calculating the distance travelled was to know, at
the very moment, the accurate home time. But the greatest problem is: how can a sailor
know the home time at sea?
C
The simple and again obvious answer is that one takes an accurate clock with him, which he
sets to the home time before leaving. A comparison with the local time (easily identified by
checking the position of the Sun) would indicate the time difference between the home time
and the local time, and thus the distance from home was obtained. The truth was that
nobody in the 18th century had ever managed to create a clock that could endure the violent
shaking of a ship and the fluctuating temperature while still maintaining the accuracy of time
for navigation.
D
After 1714, as an attempt to find a solution to the problem, the British government offered a
tremendous amount of £20,000, which were to be managed by the magnificently named
‘Board of Longitude’. If timekeeper was the answer (and there could be other proposed
solutions, since the money wasn’t only offered for timekeeper), then the error of the required
timekeeping for achieving this goal needed to be within 2.8 seconds a day, which was
considered impossible for any clock or watch at sea, even when they were in their finest
conditions.
E
This award, worth about £2 million today, inspired the self-taught Yorkshire carpenter John
Harrison to attempt a design for a practical marine clock. In the later stage of his early
career, he worked alongside his younger brother James. The first big project of theirs was to
build a turret clock for the stables at Brockelsby Park, which was revolutionary because it
required no lubrication. Harrison designed a marine clock in 1730, and he travelled to
London in seek of financial aid. He explained his ideas to Edmond Halley, the Astronomer
Royal, who then introduced him to George Graham, Britain’s first-class clockmaker. Graham
provided him with financial aid for his early-stage work on sea clocks. It took Harrison five
years to build Harrison Number One or HI. Later, he sought the improvement from alternate
design and produced H4 with the giant clock appearance. Remarkable as it was, the Board
of Longitude wouldn’t grant him the prize for some time until it was adequately satisfied.
F
Harrison had a principal contestant for the tempting prize at that time, an English
mathematician called John Hadley, who developed sextant. The sextant is the tool that
people adopt to measure angles, such as the one between the Sun and the horizon, for a
calculation of the location of ships or planes. In addition, his invention is significant since it
can help determine longitude.
G
Most chronometer forerunners of that particular generation were English, but that doesn’t
mean every achievement was made by them. One wonderful figure in the history is the
Lancastrian Thomas Earnshaw, who created the ultimate form of chronometer escapement
—the spring detent escapement—and made the final decision on format and productions
system for the marine chronometer, which turns it into a genuine modem commercial
product, as well as a safe and pragmatic way of navigation at sea over the next century and
half.
Questions 1-5
Reading Passage 1 has seven paragraphs, A-G.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
1 a description of Harrison’s background
2 problems caused by poor ocean navigation
3 the person who gave financial support to Harrison
4 an analysis of the long-term importance of sea clock invention
5 the practical usage of longitude
Questions 6-8
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 6-8 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
6 In theory, sailors can easily calculate their longitude position at sea.
7 To determine longitude, the measurement of the distance from the Moon to the given star
is a must.
8 Greenwich Mean Time was set up by the English navigators.
Questions 9-14
Complete the sentences below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for each
answer.
Write your answers in boxes 9-14 on your answer sheet.
9 Sailors were able to use the position of the Sun to calculate ……………………
10 An invention that could win the competition would lose no more than …………………….
every day.
11 John and James Harrison’s clock worked accurately without ………………………….
12 Harrison’s main competitor’s invention was known as ………………………….
13 Hadley’s instrument can use …………………………. to make a calculation of location of
ships or planes.
14 The modem version of Harrison’s invention is called ……………………………
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READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 15-27 which are based on Reading
Passage 2 below.
Ancient People in Sahara
On Oct. 13, 2000, Paul Sereno, a professor from the University of Chicago, guided a team
of palaeontologists to climb out of three broken Land Rovers, contented their water bottles
and walked across the toffee-coloured desert called Tenere Desert. Tenere, one of the most
barren areas on the Earth, is located on the southern flank of Sahara. According to the
turbaned nomads Tuareg who have ruled this infertile domain for a few centuries, this
California-size ocean of sand and rock is a ‘desert within a desert’. In the Tenere Desert,
massive dunes might stretch a hundred miles, as far as the eyes can reach. In addition,
120-degree heat waves and inexorable winds can take almost all the water from a human
body in less than a day.
Mike Hettwer, a photographer in the team, was attracted by the amazing scenes and walked
to several dunes to take photos of the amazing landscape. When reaching the first slope of
the dune, he was shocked by the fact that the dunes were scattered with many bones. He
photographed these bones with his digital camera and went to the Land Rover in a hurry. ‘I
found some bones,’ Hettwer said to other group members, ‘to my great surprise, they do not
belong to the dinosaurs. They are human bones.’
One day in the spring of 2005, Paul Sereno got in touch with Elena Garcea, a prestigious
archaeologist at the University of Cassino in Italy, asking her to return to the site with him
together. After spending 30 years in researching the history of Nile in Sudan and of the
mountains in the Libyan Desert, Garcea got well acquainted with the life of the ancient
people in Sahara. But she did not know Sereno before this exploration, whose claim of
having found so many skeletons in Tenere desert was unreliable to some archaeologists,
among whom one person considered Sereno just as a ‘moonlighting palaeontologist’.
However, Garcea was so obsessive with his perspective as to accept his invitation willingly.
In the following three weeks, Sereno and Garcea (along with five excavators, five Tuareg
guides, and five soldiers from Niger’s army) sketched a detailed map of the destined site,
which was dubbed Gobero after the Tuareg name for the area, a place the ancient Kiffian
and Tuareg nomads used to roam. After that, they excavated eight tombs and found twenty
pieces of artefacts for the above mentioned two civilisations. From these artefacts, it is
evidently seen that Kiffian fishermen caught not only the small fish, but also some huge
ones: the remains of Nile perch, a fierce fish weighing about 300 pounds, along with those
of the alligators and hippos, were left in the vicinity of dunes.
Sereno went back with some essential bones and artefacts, and planned for the next trip to
the Sahara area. Meanwhile, he pulled out the teeth of skeletons carefully and sent them to
a researching laboratory for radiocarbon dating. The results indicated that while the smaller
‘sleeping’ bones might date back to 6,000 years ago (well within the Tenerian period), the
bigger compactly tied artefacts were approximately 9,000 years old, just in the heyday of
Kiffian era. The scientists now can distinguish one culture from the other.
In the fall of 2006, for the purpose of exhuming another 80 burials, these people had another
trip to Gobero, taking more crew members and six extra scientists specialising in different
areas. Even at the site, Chris Stojanowski, bio-archaeologist in Arizona State University,
found some clues by matching the pieces. Judged from the bones, the Kiffian could be a
people of peace and hardworking. ‘No injuries in heads or forearms indicate that they did not
fight too much,’ he said. ‘And they had strong bodies.’ He pointed at a long narrow femur
and continued, ‘From this muscle attachment, we could infer the huge leg muscles, which
means this individual lived a strenuous lifestyle and ate much protein. Both of these two
inferences coincide with the lifestyle of the people living on fishing.’ To create a striking
contrast, he displayed a femur of a Tenerian male. This ridge was scarcely seen. ‘This
individual had a less laborious lifestyle, which you might expect of the herder.’
Stojanowski concluded that the Tenerian were herders, which was consistent with the other
scholars’ dominant view of the lifestyle in Sahara area 6,000 years ago, when the dry
climate favoured herding rather than hunting. But Sereno proposed some confusing points:
if the Tenerian was herders, where were the herds? Despite thousands of animal bones
excavated in Gobero, only three cow skeletons were found, and none of goats or sheep
found. ‘It is common for the herding people not to kill the cattle, particularly in a cemetery.’
Elena Garcea remarked, ‘Even the modem pastoralists such as Niger’s Wodaabe are
reluctant to slaughter the animals in their herd.’ Sereno suggested, ‘Perhaps the Tenerian in
Gobero were a transitional group that had still relied greatly on hunting and fishing and not
adopted herding completely.’

Questions 15-18
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 15-18 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
15 The pictures of rock engravings found in. Green Sahara is similar to those in other
places.
16 Tenere Desert was quite a fertile area in Sahara Desert.
17 Hettwer found human remains in the desert by chance.
18 Sereno and Garcea have cooperated in some archaeological activities before studying
ancient Sahara people.

Questions 19-21
Answer the questions below.
Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER from the passage for
each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 19-21 on your answer sheet.
19 What did Sereno and Garcea produce in the initial weeks before digging work?
20 What did Sereno send to the research centre?
21 How old were the bigger tightly bundled burials having been identified estimated to be?
Questions 22-27
Complete the notes below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 22-27 on your answer sheet.
A comparative study of two ancient cultures
the Kiffian
—They seemed to be peaceful and industrious since the reseacher did not find 22…………..
……… on their heads and forearms.
—Their lifestyle was 23………………………
—Through the observation on the huge leg muscles, it could be inferred that their diet had
plenty of 24………………………
the Tenerian
—Stojanowski presumed that the Tenerian preferred herding to 25………………….…..
—But only the bones of individual animals such as 26…………..………… were found.
—Sereno supposed the Tenerian in Gobero lived in a 27…………………….. group at that
time
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-40 which are based on Reading
Passage 3 below.
Quantitative Research in Education
Many education researchers used to work on the assumption that children experience
different phases of development, and that they cannot execute the most advanced level of
cognitive operation until they have reached the most advanced forms of cognitive process.
For example, one researcher Piaget had a well-known experiment in which he asked the
children to compare the amount of liquid in containers with different shapes. Those
containers had the same capacity, but even when the young children were demonstrated
that the same amount of fluid could be poured between the containers, many of them still
believed one was larger than the other. Piaget concluded that the children were incapable of
performing the logical task in figuring out that the two containers were the same size even
though they had different shapes, because their cognitive development had not reached the
necessary phase. Critics on his work, such as Donaldson, have questioned this
interpretation. They point out the possibility that the children were just unwilling to play the
experimenter’s game, or that they did not quite understand the question asked by the
experimenter. These criticisms surely do state the facts, but more importantly, it suggests
that experiments are social situations where interpersonal interactions take place. The
implication here is that Piaget’s investigation and his attempts to replicate it are not solely
about measuring the children’s capabilities of logical thinking, but also the degree to which
they could understand the directions for them, their willingness to comply with these
requirements, how well the experimenters did in communicating the requirements and in
motivating those children, etc.
The same kinds of criticisms have been targeted to psychological and educational tests. For
instance, Mehan argues that the subjects might interpret the test questions in a way different
from that meant by the experimenter. In a language development test, researchers show
children a picture of a medieval fortress, complete with moat, drawbridge, parapets and
three initial consonants in it: D, C, and G. The children are required to circle the correct
initial consonant for ‘castle’. The answer is C, but many kids choose D. When asked what
the name of the building was, the children responded ‘Disneyland’. They adopted the
reasoning line expected by the experimenter but got to the wrong substantive answer. The
score sheet with the wrong answers does not include in it a child’s lack of reasoning
capacity; it only records that the children gave a different answer rather than the one the
tester expected.
Here we are constantly getting questions about how valid the measures are where the
findings of the quantitative research are usually based. Some scholars such as Donaldson
consider these as technical issues, which can be resolved through more rigorous
experimentation. In contrast, others like Mehan reckon that the problems are not merely with
particular experiments or tests, but they might legitimately jeopardise the validity of all
researches of this type.
Meanwhile, there are also questions regarding the assumption in the logic of quantitative
educational research that causes can be identified through physical and/or statistical
manipulation of the variables. Critics argue that this does not take into consideration the
nature of human social life by assuming it to be made up of static, mechanical causal
relationships, while in reality, it includes complicated procedures of interpretation and
negotiation, which do not come with determinate results. From this perspective, it is not
clear that we can understand the pattern and mechanism behind people’s behaviours simply
in terms of the casual relationships, which are the focuses of quantitative research. It is
implied that social life is much more contextually variable and complex.
Such criticisms of quantitative educational research have also inspired more and more
educational researchers to adopt qualitative methodologies during the last three or four
decades. These researchers have steered away from measuring and manipulating variables
experimentally or statistically. There are many forms of qualitative research, which is loosely
illustrated by terms like ‘ethnography’, ‘case study’, ‘participant observation’, ‘life history’,
‘unstructured interviewing’, ‘discourse analysis’ and so on. Generally speaking, though, it
has characteristics as follows:
Qualitative researches have an intensive focus on exploring the nature of certain
phenomena in the field of education, instead of setting out to test hypotheses about them. It
also inclines to deal with ‘unstructured data’, which refers to the kind of data that have not
been coded during the collection process regarding a closed set of analytical categories. As
a result, when engaging in observation, qualitative researchers use audio or video devices
to record what happens or write in detail open-ended field-notes, instead of coding
behaviour concerning a pre-determined set of categories, which is what quantitative
researchers typically would do when conducting ‘systematic observation’. Similarly, in an
interview, interviewers will ask open-ended questions instead of ones that require specific
predefined answers of the kind typical, like in a postal questionnaire. Actually, qualitative
interviews are often designed to resemble casual conversations.
The primary forms of data analysis include verbal description and explanations and involve
explicit interpretations of both the meanings and functions of human behaviours. At most,
quantification and statistical analysis only play a subordinate role. The sociology of
education and evaluation studies were the two areas of educational research where-
criticism of quantitative research and the development of qualitative methodologies initially
emerged in the most intense way. A series of studies conducted by Lacey, Hargreaves and
Lambert in a boys’ grammar school, a boys’ secondary modem school, and a girls’ grammar
school in Britain in the 1960s marked the beginning of the trend towards qualitative research
in the sociology of education. Researchers employed an ethnographic or participant
observation approach, although they did also collect some quantitative data, for instance on
friendship patterns among the students. These researchers observed lessons, interviewed
both the teachers and the students, and made the most of school records. They studied the
schools for a considerable amount of time and spent plenty of months gathering data and
tracking changes over all these years.

Questions 28-32
Look at the following statements or descriptions (Questions 28-32) and the list of people
below.
Match each statement or description with the correct person or people, A, B, C or D
Write the correct letter, A, B, C or D, in boxes 28-32 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
Lists of People
A Piaget
B Mehan
C Donaldson
D Lacey, Hargreaves and Lambert
28 A wrong answer indicates more of a child’s different perspective than incompetence in
reasoning.
29 Logical reasoning involving in the experiment is beyond children’s cognitive
development.
30 Children’s reluctance to comply with the game rules or miscommunication may be
another explanation.
31 There is an indication of a scientific observation approach in research.
32 There is a detail of flaw in experiments on children’s language development.

Questions 33-36
Complete the sentences below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 33-36 on your answer sheet.
33 In Piaget’s experiment, he asked the children to distinguish the amount of
……………………… in different containers.
34 Subjects with the wrong answer more inclined to answer ‘………………………….’
instead of their wrong answer D in Mehan’s question.
35 Some people criticised the result of Piaget experiment, but Donaldson thought the flaw
could be rectified by ……………………….
36 Most qualitative researches conducted by Lacey, Hargreaves and Lambert were done
in a …………………………

Questions 37-39
Choose THREE letters, A-F.
Write the correct letters in boxes 37-39 on your answer sheet.
The list below includes characteristics of the ‘qualitative research’.
Which THREE are mentioned by the writer of the passage?
A Coding behavior in terms of predefined set of categories
B Designing an interview as an easy conversation
C Working with well-organised data in a closed set of analytical categories
D Full of details instead of loads of data in questionnaires
E Asking to give open-ended answers in questionnaires
F Recording the researching situation and applying note-taking
Question 40
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D. Write the correct letter in box 40 on your answer
sheet.
What is the main idea of the passage?
A to prove that quantitative research is most applicable to children’s education
B to illustrate the society lacks of deep comprehension of educational approach
C to explain the ideas of quantitative research and the characteristics of the related
criticisms
D to imply qualitative research is a flawless method compared with quantitative one