IELTS READING VOL TEST 1+2 LƯU Ý TRƯỚC KHI LÀM BÀI

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1. Đề số 1
1.1 READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1–13, which are based
on Reading Passage 1 below.

The development of the silk industry

Silk, a natural fibre produced by a particular worm called a silkworm, has been
used in clothing for many centuries.

When silk was first discovered in China over 4,500 years ago, it was reserved
exclusively for the use of the emperor, his close relations and the very highest
of his dignitaries. Within the palace, the emperor is believed to have worn a
robe of white silk; outside, he, his principal wife, and the heir to the throne
wore yellow, the colour of the earth.

Gradually silk came into more general use, and the various classes of
Chinese society began wearing tunics of silk. As well as being used for
clothing and decoration, silk was quite quickly put to industrial use, and rapidly
became one of the principal elements of the Chinese economy. It was used in
the production of musical instruments, as string for fishing, and even as the
world’s first luxury paper. Eventually even the common people were able to
wear garments of silk.

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During the Han dynasty (206 BC-220 AD), silk ceased to be a mere fabric and
became a form of currency. Farmers paid their taxes in grain and silk, and silk
was used to pay civil servants and to reward subjects for outstanding
services. Values were calculated in lengths of silk as they had previously been
calculated in weight of gold. Before long, silk became a currency used in trade
with foreign countries, which continued into the Tang dynasty (616-907 AD). It
is possible that this added importance was the result of a major increase in
production. Silk also found its way so thoroughly into the Chinese language
that 230 of the 5,000 most common characters of Mandarin* have 'silk' as
their key component. Silk became a precious commodity, highly sought after
by other countries from an early date, and it is believed that the silk trade.

actually existed before the Silk Road1" was officially opened in the second
century BC. An Egyptian mummy with a silk thread in her hair, dating from
1070 BC, has been discovered in the village of Deir el Medina near the Valley
of the Kings, and is probably the earliest evidence of the silk trade. During the
second century BC, the Chinese emperor Han Wu Di’s ambassadors travelled
as far west as Persia and Mesopotamis, bearing gifts including silks. A range
of important finds of Chinese silks have also been made along the Silk Road.
One of the most dramatic of these finds was some Tang silk discovered in
1900. It is believed that around 1015 AD Buddhist monks, possibly alarmed by
the threat of invasion by Tibetan people, had sealed more than ten thousand
manuscripts and silk paintings, silk banners and textiles in caves near
Dunhuang, a trading station on the Silk Road in north-west China.

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Some historians believe the first Europeans to set eyes upon the fabulous
fabric were the Roman legions of Marcus Licinius Crassus, Governor of Syria.
According to certain accounts of the period, at an important battle near the
Euphrates River in 53 BC, the Roman soldiers were so startled by the bright
silken banners of the enemy that they fled in panic. Yet, within decades
Chinese silks were widely worn by the rich and noble families of Rome. The
Roman Emperor Heliogabalus (218-222 AD) wore nothing but silk. By 380
AD, the Roman historian Marcellinnus Ammianus reported that. The use of
silk, which was one confined to the nobility, has now spread to all classes
without distinction - even to the lowest. The desire for silk continued to
increase over the centuries. Despite this demand, the price of silk remained
very high.

In spite of their secrecy about production methods, the Chinese eventually lost
their monopoly on silk production. Knowledge of silk production methods
reached Korea around 200 BC, when waves of Chinese immigrants arrived
there. Shortly after 300 AD, it travelled westward, and the cultivation of the
silkworm was established in India.

Around 550 AD silk production reached the Middle East. Records indicate that
two monks from Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul), capital of the
Byzantine Empire, appeared at their emperor’s court with silkworm eggs
which they had obtained secretly, and hidden in their hollow bamboo walking
sticks. Under their supervision the eggs hatched into worms, and the worms
spun silk threads. Byzantium was in the silk business at last. The Byzantine
church and state created imperial workshops, monopolising production and
keeping the secret to themselves. This allowed a silk industry to be
established, undercutting the market for ordinary-grade Chinese silk.
However, high quality silk textiles, woven in China especially for the Middle

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Eastern market, continued to achieve high prices in the West, and trade along
the Silk Road continued as before. By the sixth century the Persians, too, had
mastered the art of silk weaving, developing their own rich patterns and
techniques. But it wasn’t until the 13th century that Italy began silk production,
with the introduction of 2,000 skilled silk weavers from Constantinople.
Eventually, silk production became widespread throughout Europe.

World silk production has approximately doubled during the last 30 years in
spite of man­made fibres replacing certain uses of silk. Before this period,
China and Japan were the two main producers, together manufacturing more
than 50 per cent of world production each year. After the late 1970s, however,
China dramatically increased its silk production, and once again became the
world’s leading producer.

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Questions 1-7
Complete the notes below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 1-7 on your answer sheet

Chinese silk
Early Uses
Clothing
- at first, silk only available to Chinese of high rank
- emperor wore 1................silk indoors
In industry
- silk items included parts of musical instruments, fishing strings and
2................
Currency
- silk was used as payment of 3................ as well as for wages and rewards
- silk replaced 4................as a unit of value
- silk soon used as payment in 5................ trade
Evidence of silk trade
1070 BC, Egypt:
- hair of a 6................contained silk
- 2nd century BC, Persia and Mesopotamia: gifts of silk were presented by
Chinese ambassadors
1015 AD, north-west China:
- silk objects were hidden inside 7................

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Questions 8-13
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading
Passage 1 ?
In boxes 8-13 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
8. Their first sight of silk created fear among Roman soldiers.

9. The quality of Chinese silk imported by the early Romans varied widely.

10. The Byzantine emperor first acquired silkworm eggs from the Chinese
emperor.

11. The price of high-grade Chinese silk fell due to competition from
Middle-Eastern producers.

12. Silk was produced in the Middle East several centuries before it was
produced in Europe.

13. Global silk production has declined in recent years.

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1.2 READING PASSAGE 2

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14–26, which are
based on Reading Passage 2 below.

The discovery of a baby mammoth

A near-perfect frozen mammoth offers clues to a great vanished species

A. On a May morning in 2007, on the Yamal Peninsula in northwestern

Siberia, a Nenets reindeer herder named Yuri Khudi stood on a sandbar on
the Yuribey River, looking carefully at a diminutive corpse. Although he'd
never seen such an animal before, Khudi had seen many mammoth tusks, the
thick corkscrew shafts that his people found each summer, and this
persuaded him the corpse was a baby mammoth. It was eerily well preserved.
Apart from its missing hair and toenails, it was perfectly intact. Khudi realised
the find might be significant and he knew he couldn't just return home and
forget all about it. He therefore decided to travel to the small town of Yar Sale
to consult an old friend named Kirill Serotetto. His friend took him to meet the
director of the local museum, who persuaded the local authorities to fly Khudi
and Serotetto back to the Yuribey River to collect the baby mammot

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B. Mammoths became extinct between 14,000 and 10,000 years ago and
since the extinctions coincided with the end of the most recent Ice age, many
researchers believe that the primary cause of the great die-off was the sharp
rise in temperature, which dramatically altered the vegetation. 'We have
strong evidence that the temperature rise played a significant part in their
extinction.’ says Adrian Lister, a palaeontologist and mammoth expert at
London's Natural History Museum. 'In Eurasia, the timing of the two events
matches closely.' The extinctions also coincided, however, with the arrival of
modern humans. In addition to exploiting mammoths for food, they used their
bones and tusks to make weapons, tools, and even dwellings. Some
scientists believe humans were as much to blame as the temperature rise for
the great die-off. Some say they caused it.

C. The body of the baby mammoth was eventually sent to the st Petersburg
Zoological Museum in Russia. Alexei Tikhonov, the museum's director, was
one of the first scientists to view the baby, a female. According to Tikhonov,
Khudi had rescued 'the best preserved mammoth to come down to US from
the Ice Age', and he gratefully named her Lyuba, after Khudi's wife. Tikhonov
knew that no-one would be more excited by the find than Dan Fisher, an
American colleague at the University of Michigan who had spent 30 years
researching the lives of mammoths. Tikhonov invited Fisher, along with
Bernard Buigues, a French mammoth hunter, to come and view the baby
mammoth. Fisher and Buigues had examined other specimens together,
including infants, but these had been in a relatively poor state. Lyuba was
another story entirely, other than the missing hair and toenails, the only flaw in
her pristine appearance was a curious dent above the trunk.

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D. Fisher was particularly excited about one specific part of Lyuba's anatomy:
her milk tusks. Through his career, Fisher has taken hundreds of tusk
samples. Most of these came from the Great Lakes region of North America,
and his research showed that these animals continued to thrive, despite the
late Pleistocene* temperature change. On the other hand, Pleistocene era:
the time between roughly 2.6 million years ago and 10.000 years ago to
Fisher the tusks often revealed telltale evidence of human hunting. His
samples frequently came from animals that had died in the autumn, when they
should have been at their peak after summer grazing, and less likely to die of
natural causes, but also when humans would have been most eager to
stockpile meat for the coming winter. He has done limited work in Siberia, but
his analysis of tusks from Wrangel Island, off the coast of Siberia, suggests
the same conclusion.

E. In December 2007, Buigues arranged for the specimen to be transported to

Japan to undergo a CT scan by Naoki Suzuki of the Jikei University School of
Medicine. The test confirmed her skeleton was undamaged, and her internal
organs seemed largely intact. It also showed that the end of her trunk, and her
throat, mouth, and windpipe were filled with dense sediment. Six months later,
in a laboratory in st Petersburg, Fisher, Buigues, Suzuki, Tikhonov and other
colleagues began a three-day series of tests on Lyuba. During these, Fisher
noted a dense mix of clay and sand in her trunk, mouth and throat, which had
been indicated earlier by the scan. In fact, the sediment in Lyuba's trunk was
packed so tightly that Fisher saw it as a possible explanation for the dent
above her trunk. If she was frantically fighting for breath and inhaled
convulsively, perhaps a partial vacuum was created in the base of her trunk,
which would have flattened surrounding soft tissue. To Fisher, the
circumstances of Lyuba's death were clear: she had asphyxiated. Suzuki,

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however, proposed a different interpretation, seeing more evidence for

drowning than asphyxiation.

F. Studies are ongoing, but Lyuba has begun to shed the secrets of her short
life and some clues to the fate of her kind. Her good general health was
shown in the record of her dental development, a confirmation for Fisher that
dental research is useful for evaluating health and thus key to investigating
the causes of mammoth extinction. Analysis of her well- preserved DNA has
revealed that she belonged to a distinct population of Mammuthus primigenius
and that, soon after her time, another population migrating to Siberia from
North America would take their place. Finally, Lyuba's premolars and tusks
revealed that she had been born in late spring and was only a month old when
she died.

Questions 14-18
Reading Passage 2 has six paragraphs, A-F.
Which paragraph contains the following information?
Write the correct letter, A-F, in boxes 14-18 on your answer sheet.
14. Similarities between studies of mammoth remains from different parts of
the world.

15. Details of the uses to which mammoth body parts were put.

16. A theory that accounts for the damage to lyuba's face.

17. An explanation of how an individual was able to identify a small corpse.

18. A comparison between lyuba and other young mammoth corpses.

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Questions 19-23
Look at the following statements (Questions 19-23) and the list of people
below.
Match each statement with the correct person, A-G.
Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 19-23 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.

List of People
A.Yuri Khudi
B.Kirill Serotetto
C.Adrian Lister
D.Alexei Tikhonov
E.Dan Fisher
F.Bermard Buigues
G.Naoki Suzuki

19. The indications are that mammoths died as a result of climate change.
20. Teeth analysis is important in discovering why mammoths died out.
21. The corpse of the baby mammoth is in better condition than any other that
has been discovered.
22. It would be a mistake to ignore the baby mammoth's discovery, because of
its potential importance.
23. Mammoths often died at a time of year when they should have been in
good physical condition.

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Questions 24 - 26
Complete the sentences below.
Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 24-26 on your answer sheet.

24. Some researchers say that a marked rise in temperature impacted on

mammoths by changing the type of. ........... available.
25. Fisher concluded that many of the mammoth tusks he looked at displayed
signs of ........... .
26. Not long after Lyuba's death, the Mammuthus primigenius group she
belonged to was replaced by another group that came from ............

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1.3 READING PASSAGE 3

What makes a musical expert?

Does that class of people acknowledged to be musical experts just have more
of the same basic skills we are all endowed with, or do they have a set of
abilities - or neural structures - that are totally different from those of the rest
of US? Are high levels of musical achievement simply the result of training
and practice, or are they based on innate brain structure - what we refer to as
‘talent’? Talent can be defined as something that originates in genetic
structures and that is identifiable by trained people who can recognize its
existence before a person has achieved exceptional levels of performance.
The emphasis on early identification means that to investigate it, we study the
development of skills in children.

It is evident that some children acquire skills more rapidly than others: the age
of onset for walking and talking varies widely, even between children in the
same household. There may be genetic factors at work, but these are closely
linked with other factors - with a presumably environmental component - such
as motivation and family dynamics. Similar factors can influence musical
development and can mask the contribution of genetics to musical ability.

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Brain studies, so far, haven’t been of much use in sorting out the issues.
Gottfried Schlaug at Harvard collected brain scans of individuals with absolute
pitch (AP) and showed that a region in the brain called the planum temporale
is larger in these people than in others. This suggests that the planum is
involved in AP, but it’s not clear if it starts out larger in people who eventually
acquire AP, or if the acquisition of AP makes the planum increase in size.

Results of research into the areas of the brain involved in skilled motor
movement are more conclusive. Studies of violin players have shown that the
region of the brain responsible for controlling the movement of the left hand
(the hand that requires greater precision in violin playing) increases in size as
a result of practice. We do not know yet if the propensity for increase
pre-exists in some-peopled not others.

The evidence against talent comes from research on how much training the
experts do. Like experts in mathematics, chess, or sports, experts in music
require lengthy periods of instruction and practice. In several studies, the very
best music students w ere found to have practiced more than twice as much
as the others. In another study, students were secretly divided into two groups
based on teachers’ perceptions of their talent. Several years later, it was
found that the students who achieved the highest performance ratings had
practiced the most, irrespective of which ‘talent’ group they had been
assigned to, suggesting that practice does not merely correlate with
achievement, but causes it.

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Anders Ericsson, at Florida state University, approaches the topic of musical

expertise as a general problem in cognitive psychology. He takes as a starting
point the assumption that there are certain issues involved in becoming an
expert at anything; that we can learn about musical expertise by studying
expert chess players, athletes, artists, mathematicians, as well as the
musicians themselves. The emerging picture from such studies is that ten
thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery
associated with being a world-class expert - in anything. In study after study,
of composers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players and master
criminals, this number comes up again and again. Someone would do this
amount of practice if they practiced, for example, roughly 20 hours a week for
ten years. Of course, this does not address why some people do not seem to
get anywhere when they practice, and why some people get more out of their
practice sessions than others. But no-one has yet found a case in which true
world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the
brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery.

The ten-thousand-hour theory is consistent with what we know about how the
brain learns. Learning requires the assimilation and consolidation of
information in neural tissue. The more experiences we have with something,
the stronger the memory/learning trace for that experience becomes. Although
people differ in how long it takes them to consolidate information neutrally, it
remains true that increased practice leads to a greater number of neural
traces, which create stronger memory representation.

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The classic rebuttal to this theory goes something like this: ‘What about
Mozart? I hear that he composed his first symphony at the age of four!’ First,
there is a factual error here: Mozart did not write it until he was eight, still, this
is unusual, to say the least. However, this early work received little acclaim
and was not performed very often. In fact, the only reason we know about it is
because the child who wrote it grew up to become Mozart. And Mozart had an
expert teacher in his father, who was renowned as a teacher of musicians all
over Europe. We do not know how much Mozart practiced, but if he started at
age two and worked thirty- two hours a week (quite possible, given that his
father was a stern taskmaster) he would have made his ten thousand hours
by the time he composed his first symphony. This does not mean that there
are no genetic factors involved in Mozart’s greatness, but that inborn traits
may not be the only cause.

* individuals with absolute pitch: people who can identify or sing any musical
note correctly without help

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Questions 1-4
Choose the correct letter A, C or D.

1. In the first paragraph, the writer suggests that a musician who is

‘talented’ is someone

A. who is aware of being set apart from other people.

B. whose brain structure is unlike that of other people.

C. who can perform extremely well in early childhood.

D. whose essential skills are more varied than those of ordinary people.

2. According to the winter, what is unclear about the findings of

Gottfried Schlaug?

A. Which part of the brain is linked to a particular musical skill,

B. Which type of musical skill leads to the greatest change in the brain

C. Whether a feature of the brain is a cause or an effect of a musical skill

D. Whether the acquisition of a musical skill is easier for some people than
others

3. According to the writer, what has been established by studies of violin

players?

A. Changes may occur in the brain following violin practice.

B. Left-handed violinists have a different brain structure from other people.

C. A violinist’s hand size is not due to practice but to genetic factors.

D. Violinists are born with brains that have a particular structure.

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4. According to the writer, findings on the amount of practice done by

expert musicians suggest that

A. talent may have little to do with expertise.

B. practice may actually prevent the development of talent.

C. talent may not be recognised by teachers.

D. expertise may be related to quality of instruct

Questions 5-10

Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading
Passage

YES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writer

NO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer

NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

5. Anders Ericsson's work with cognitive psychology has influenced other

researchers.

6. Different areas of expertise seem to have one specific thing in common.

7. In order to be useful, practice must be carried out regularly every day.

8. Anyone who practices for long enough can reach the level of a world-class
expert.

9. Occasionally, someone can become an expert at global level with fewer

than 10,000 hours’ practice.

10. Existing knowledge of learning and cognitive skills supports the

importance of practice.

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Questions 11 - 14

Complete the summary using the list of words, A-J below

Write the correct letter A-J, in boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet

A. popular

B. artistic

C. completed

D. eight

E. tuition

F. encouragement

G. inherited

H. four

I. practice

J. two

Mozart

The case of Mozart could be quoted as evidence against the

10,000-hour-practice theory. However, the writer points out that the young
Mozart received a lot of 11 ................ from his father, and that the symphony
he wrote at the age of 12 ................ was not 13 ................ and may be of only
academic interest. The case therefore supports the view that expertise is not
solely the result of 14................ characteristics.

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2. Đề số 2
2.1 Passage 1
The Clipper Races: an era of competition between cargo
ships

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the British East India
Company had the monopoly on trade with China and India. This meant that
because no rival could legally import tea or other goods from these countries
at this time, the company was rarely in a hurry to transport its merchandise.
Instead, its priority was to minimise costs by carrying as much as possible on
each ship. This meant that its ships - known as East Indiamen - were
enormous, strong and very slow.
By 1800, the average East Indiaman could carry 1,200 tons of merchandise.
The trading pattern for China tea usually meant the East Indiamen set sail
from Britain in January, sailed round the Cape of Good Hope at the
southernmost tip of Africa, and arrived in China in September. There they
would load up that year's tea harvest, set off again and, depending on the
wind and weather, aim to arrive back by the following September. So even
with favourable sailing conditions, the round trip lasted almost two years, and
if anything went wrong it could take a lot longer.

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However, by 1834 the company had lost its trading monopolies, and tea had
become a freely traded item. Having no more use for its great ships, the
company sold them off, and many were bought by merchants or their
captains, who continued to plough the seas between Britain and China. But
now that tea could be traded freely, a few smart sailors began to realise that
whoever brought each new harvest of tea to Britain first, stood to make the
most money.
This was partly because if you were home first, you could sell your shipment
of tea before your competitors even arrived, and partly because consumers in
Britain in the nineteenth century believed that the fresher and earlier-picked
the tea, the better the resulting drink. Tea traders now needed faster, sleeker
ships to bring their precious cargo back. Nevertheless, in Britain this idea only
caught on slowly, and white the 1840s saw a few faster ships launched, for
the time being many merchants remained satisfied with the slow but reliable
East Indiamen.
In fact it was the Americans who pioneered the first clipper ships. These
vessels were fast and slender, with a narrow hull that was deeper at the back
than at the front and masses of sails on tall masts. They earned their name
from the way that they clipped off journey times British merchants resolved to
build their own clippers to rival the Americans and the first British tea clipper,
Stornaway, was built in Aberdeen in 1850 More tea clippers were designed
and built in Britain throughout the 1850s and 1860s, they had a narrower
beam than their American equivalents, making them less powerful during
storms, but faster in calmer weather.

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There was a great spirit of competition between the British and American
ships plying the tea trade, but to begin with the Americans had the edge. Then
in 1851 a British ship owner, Richard Green, built the aptly named clipper
Challenger, with the stated intention of beating the American ships. Loaded
with tea, Challenger left China for London in 1852 at the same time as the
American clipper Challenge, a much larger, older ship, already greatly
admired for its speed. Large sums were bet on which would complete the
journey first. In the event, the British ship beat its rival to London by two days,
amid much jubilation. From then on, such international races grew in
popularity.
After 1855, American participation in the British tea trade gradually stopped.
But even without the Anglo-American rivalry, the competitive spirit continued.
It was really ignited when new ports were opened up for trade in China. These
included Fouchow, which was much closer to the tea-producing areas than
Canton, the port used previously. As a result, tea could be loaded onboard
earlier and fresher, and the clippers could set off in late May or early June -
sometimes not even taking time to fill out the official paperwork - racing back
to Britain whatever the difficulties.
They sped down through the South China Sea and into the Indian Ocean,
then raced to get round the southernmost tip of Africa at the Cape of Good
Hope. Then it was north across the vast Atlantic, past the Azores, through the
English Channel and into the estuary of the River Thames. Once there, they
would be towed by tugs, up the river and into the docks.

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The cargo of the winning ship could earn a premium of up to sixpence per
pound-and so the captain and crew were rewarded by the owners of the
cargo. But the races were about more than just money the crews, about 40
men on each clipper, were expert sailors, proud of their ships, and they
delighted in competing against each other. Without their enthusiasm, the
races would never have happened, since getting the ship home as fast as
possible required the crew to be totally dedicated and to sacrifice much of
their rest for the duration of the race.

Questions 1 - 6

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading

Passage 1? In boxes 1-6 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

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1. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the British East India
Company faced a lot of competition.

2. Before 1800, cargo size was the most important consideration for the East
India Company.

3. At best, voyages of the East Indiamen to China and back took nearly two
years to complete.

4. Before 1834, voyages to and from China were considered to be highly

dangerous.

5. After 1834, the ships which had served the East India Company stopped
being used for commercial purposes.

6. In the nineteenth century, British drinkers preferred tea made from mature
leaves to that made from younger leaves.

Questions 7-13

Complete the notes below. Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for
each answer. Write your answers in boxes 7-13 on your answer sheet.

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Clipper races

The ships

Clipper ships were first used for trading by American merchants.

The ships were remarkable for the number of 7 ............. they had.

The performance of British tea clippers was particularly affected when there
were 8 ............ at sea.

The races

It was in a ship called 9 ................. that the British first competed successfully
against the Americans.

Richard Green’s ship arrived two days ahead of its competitor.

Competition increased when additional Chinese trading 10 ............. were

established.

Merchants were occasionally in such a hurry that they failed to complete the
11 ............ before leaving China.

At the end of their journey, the ships needed the help of 12 ...............

The rewards

The crews were motivated by both 13 ................... and their enthusiasm for
the competition.

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 2 – ĐỀ 2
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2.2 Passage 2
Orientation of birds

A. For many of US, the way birds are able to orientate is both astounding and
difficult to appreciate fully. For instance, the annual migration of tire golden
plover of the Pacific takes it from Alaska to Hawaii on a flight of well over 3000
kilometres, and if it were to deviate by only one degree, it would miss the
island on which it nests.

B. The first systematic studies on orientation in birds were made possible by

the ‘homing instinct’ exhibited by so many species. Birds are caught at a time
when they show an attachment to their territory, especially during the nesting
season. They are taken to some spot, released, and the percentage of returns
is recorded. The distance can be varied, and the direction, as well as the
method of transporting them, and then the influence of climatic and other
factors on their ability to find their way home can be studied. These
experiments have shown a wide variation in ability to home, and three types of
homing behaviour have been identified.

C. In the first type, birds methodically explore the area in which they are
released until they pick up some familiar feature, and then they quickly find
their way back to the nest. Such birds possess a highly developed visual
memory, as experiments with pigeons have shown. Domestic pigeons have
been trained to peck at a certain point on an aerial photograph, with a system
of rewards, and four years later the birds were still able to respond to this
training when placed on the aerial photograph. Birds’ eyes have a power of
resolution two to three times greater than ours, enabling them to pick up very

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fine details. If a bird uses only this type of homing behaviour, however, it can
only succeed if the point of release is not too far away. If the birds are
transported 800 kilometres from their nest, it is only by good fortune that they
find their way back as a result of long exploratory flights. Usually, the area
known to a bird is its feeding territory. Released within this area, the birds
soon make their return; release them outside it and far fewer return. However,
if a bird is released for a second time in the same place, its visual memory
comes into play, and the bird, no longer requiring tedious exploratory flights,
will return much more quickly.

D. The second type of homing behaviour is shown by birds that are capable of
choosing their flight direction and holding to it for the rest of their journey. How
do they decide what direction to take? They appear to choose their normal
migration direction even if they are released in a different place from their
usual stalling point. If, for example, birds which normally fly to the north-east
to reach latitude 45 degrees north are released at that latitude, they will
immediately start flying north-east anyway. So if they’re released further to the
west, they’ll maintain the correct direction, but fly west of their destination, and
so fail to arrive.

E. The third type of homing behaviour shows the highest degree of

orientation. Released at one point, the birds immediately take stock of it,
compare its position with that of the nest, decide on the direction and fly off.
This happens even if the birds are in a country right off their migration routes,
where they have never been before. In one example, a laysan albatross
returned to its nesting area on Midway Island in the middle of the Pacific,
having flown over 5000 kilometres from the west coastal of the USA in just
over ten days. This is a perfect example of the third type of homing, for the

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albatross clearly couldn’t rely on any landmarks over the vast expanse of the
Pacific Ocean.
F. The percentage of successful birds varies greatly, being highest in those
species with a strong migratory behaviour. Thus the lesser black-backed gull
is more migratory than the herring gull and more often reaches ‘home’. Great
migrants such as the swift have the highest percentage of returns. In one
case, seven out of nine alpine swifts were recaptured at their nests after being
displaced some 1400 kilometres; one made the journey in three days.

G. What part does heredity play in all this? Two research studies suggest that
instinctive, i.e. genetically inherited, behaviour patterns play a part in
navigation. The first was carried out by Ernst Schuz and it is highly significant.
Schuz caught first year European storks and released them later, after the
departure of the adult storks at a time when they normally make their
south-west autumn migration to Africa. The recaptures showed that, in spite of
thefact that there were no adults to guide them, the birds unanimously headed
south-west. This was a most striking finding, for it showed that the birds had
an innate and unlearned attraction for the African wintering area that they
have occupied for thousands of years.

H. The case of starlings is a little different. These birds have a great aptitude
for homing, but this behaviour differs in the different age groups. Birds that
were shifted to the south-east of their normal migration route split into two lots.
The adults, in full possession of their gift for orientation, found their wintering
area by modifying their direction by 90 degrees, whereas the juveniles sought
their winter quarters to the south-east of their real position.

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 2 – ĐỀ 2
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Questions 1-5
Complete the summary below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from
the passage for each answer. Write your answers in boxes 1-5 on your
answer sheet.

Types of homing behaviour

First type:
Birds rely on their sophisticated 1 .................. However, they are generally
most successful if they are released within their feeding territory.
Second type:
Birds select their accustomed 2 ................, no matter where they are
released. As a result, they may miss their 3 .............
Third type:
Birds orientate correctly, even when they are released in an unfamiliar place
and have no 4 ............... to make use of. One bird with this type of skill is the 5
...................

Questions 7-9
Reading Passage has eight paragraphs, A-H.
Write the correct letter, A-H, in boxes 7-9 on your answer sheet.
NB You may use any letter more than once.
Which paragraph contains the following information?

6. the effects of distance on some birds’ ability to find their nests

7. a methodology for testing the general ability of birds to find their nests
8. one aspect of physical ability in humans and birds
9. how some birds’ migration was delayed for experimental purposes

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 2 – ĐỀ 2
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Questions 10-13
Look at the following types of birds (Questions 10-13) and the list of points
which the author wishes to illustrate below. Match each bird with the point
which it illustrates, A-G. Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 10-13 on your
answer sheet.

List of points which the author wishes to illustrate

A. an ability to orientate without previous training
B. the speed at which birds can fly
C. the ability to remember things seen previously
D. the effect of age on homing ability
E. the strength required to fly a great distance
F. a high success rate in finding nests
G. the importance of seasonal cues for migrating birds

10. domestic pigeon

11. alpine swift
12. European stork
13. starling

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 3 – ĐỀ 3
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2.3 Passage 3
The role of accidents in business

In 1894 Dr John Kellogg and his brother. Will, were supervising a hospital and
health spa in Michigan. The patients were on a restricted diet. One day, the
brothers left cooked wheat untended for more than 24 hours. When they
returned, they saw what they had done. It was no good to eat, but they
decided to run the stale wheat through rollers, just to see how it would turn
out. Normally, the process produced long sheets, but they were surprised to
discover that this time the rollers created flat flakes. They baked them, and
then tried the same thing with corn. From this accidental discovery came the
cornflakes that generations have now been eating for breakfast.

Accidents happen; there is nothing predictable and orderly about innovation.

Nobel laureate Sir Alan Hodgkin, who discovered how nerve cells transmit
electrical impulses between the skin and the brain, commented: 'I believe that
the record of my published papers conveys an impression of directedness and
planning which does not at all coincide with the actual sequence of events.’

The same rule applies in business. The mistake that gave US cornflakes
keeps repeating itself in the history of disruptive innovation, the kind that
transforms markets. Louis Daguerre, for, instance, discovered the technique
that gave US photography in the 1830s, when drops of mercury from a
shattered thermometer produced a photographic image. The microwave was
discovered when Peroy Spender, a scientist with Raytheon, was testing a new
vacuum tube and discovered that the sweet in his pocket had melted. The
artificial sweetener, saccharin, was the unintentional result of a medical
scientist’s work on a chemical treatment for gastric ulcers. While working for

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the firm 3M, researcher Art Fry had no idea he was taking the first steps
towards Post- It Notes when he used bits of adhesive office paper that could
be easily lifted off the page to replace the scrap paper bookmarks that kept
falling out of his hymn book.

Breakthrough and disruptive innovation are rarely driven by orderly process.

Usually they come out of a chaotic, haphazard mess, which is why big
companies, full of managers schooled in business programmes designed to
eliminate random variation and mistakes, struggle with them. In these sorts of
environments, accidents are called failures and are discouraged.

It is no surprise then that research from the late British economist Paul
Geroski and London Business School’s Constantinos Markides found that
companies that were skilled at innovation were usually not that skilled when it
came to commercialisation, and vice versa. Their book, Fast Second, divides
businesses into 'colonists’ and 'consolidators’. Small and nimble, colonists are
adept at creating market niches but are terrible institution builders.
Consolidators, with their strong cultures of discipline and cost control, know
how to take clever ideas from other firms and turn them into mass­market
items. Microsoft is a prime instance of this.

With companies spending hundreds of billions of dollars on research and

development, US academics Robert Austin and Lee Devin examined how
managers can encourage productive slip-ups. In their article Accident,
Intention and Expectation in the Innovation Process, they argue that business
processes actually prevent helpful mis-steps from occurring. According to their
catalogue of accidents, not all false steps and mishaps are equal. Accidents,
they say, come from unlikely mental associations such as memories and
vague connections, looking for something and finding it in an unexpected way,

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looking for one thing and finding something else, and not looking for anything
but finding something valuable.

Accident-prone innovation, they say, requires companies to get outside the

‘cone of expectation’. It means throwing together groups from diverse
backgrounds, and combining ideas in unpredictable ways, other strategies
also include having systems that watch out for accidents and examine them
for value, generating them when they do not happen often enough, seizing oil
the useful ones, capturing their valuable features, and building on them to add
value and give potential for useful accidents.

All this, however, requires thinking that is often counter-intuitive to the way
businesses operate. In other words, it is the kind of thinking that goes against
the beliefs of most business managers. It runs counter to the notion frequently
pushes by consultants that you can ‘harness’ creativity and direct it to line up
with intention. ‘The cost of accidents business, people tend to call such efforts
failure.’

There are tentative signs that more companies are starting to realise that
failure can lead to commercial gain, and that this is part or the risk-talking that
underpins innovation. Australia’s largest brewing company, for example, made
a bad error when it launched a new beer called Empire Lager, pitched at
younger consumers. Having spent a fortune creating a beer with a sweeter
taste, designing a great-looking bottle and a television campaign, Foster’s was
left with a drink that no-one wanted to buy. The target market was more
interested in brands built up by word of mouth.

Instead of wiping the unsuccessfull product launch, Fosters used this lesson
learned to go on and develop other brands instead. One of them, Pure
Blonde, is now ranked as Australia’s fifth-largest beer brand. Unlike Empire

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 3 – ĐỀ 3
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Lager, there has been almost no promotion and its sales are generated more
by word of mouth.

Other companies are taking similar steps to study their own slip-ups. Intuit, the
company behind financial tools such as Quicken, holds regular ‘When
Learning Hurts’ sessions. But this sort of transformation is never easy. In a
market that focuses on the short-term, convincing employees and
shareholders to tolerate failure and not play it safe is a big thing to ask.

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ĐỀ THI THỬ IELTS READINGBÀI ĐỌC SỐ 3 – ĐỀ 3
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Questions 1-5
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading
Passage? In boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet, write:
YES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writer
NO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writer
NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this

1. The delay in the process used by the Kellogg brothers affected the final
product.
2. Sir Alan Hodgkin is an example of someone whose work proceeded in a
logical and systematic way.
3. Daguerre is an exception to the general rule of innovation.
4. The discovery of saccharin occurred by accident during drug research.
5. The company 3M should have supported Art Fry by funding his idea of
Post-It Notes

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Questions 6-9
Complete each sentence with the correct ending, A-H, below. Write the
correct letter, A-H, in boxes 6-9 on your answer sheet.

A. can be found in unusual thoughts and chance events.

B. can be taught in business schools.
C. has made a success from someone else’s invention.
D. is designed to nurture differences.
E. is unlikely to lead to creative innovation
F. says that all mistakes are the same.
G. shows that businesses are good at either inventing of selling.
H. suggests ways of increasing the number of mistakes

6. The usual business environment

7. Geroki and Markides’s book
8. Microsoft is an example of a company which
9. The origin of useful accidents

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Questions 10-14
Choose the correct letter, A, B, c or D. Write the correct letter in boxes 10-14
on your answer sheet.

10. How do Austin and Devin advise companies to get out of the 'cone of
expectation'?
A. by decreasing the number of company systems
B. by forming teams of different types of people
C. by hiring new and creative people
D. by holding regular brainstorming meetings

11. In recommending ‘counter-intuitive’ thinking, what do Austin and

Devin imply?
A. that failing at business is bad for staff morale
B. that innovation cannot be planned for
C. that most businesses should be devoted to avoiding mistakes
D. that the cost of mistakes is an important consideration

12. The writer describes the Empire Lager disaster in order to show that
A. success can come out of a business failure
B. the majority of companies now value risk-talking.
C. TV advertising works better on older people
D. young beer drinkers do not like a sweet taste

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13. Pure Blonde has been more successful than Empire Lager because
A. digital media other than TV were used.
B. it was advertised under a different brand name.
C. it was launched with very little advertising.
D. the advertising budget was larger

14. The writer concludes that creating a culture that learns from
mistakes
A. brings short-term financial gains.
B. can be very difficult for some companies.
C. holds no risk for workers.
D. is a popular move with shareholders.

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