Youshouldspendabout20minutesonthistask.Thechartbelowgivesinformationaboutthegrowthofurbanpopulationincertainpartsoftheworldandincludespredictionsforthefuture.Summarisetheinformationbyselectingandreportingthemainfeatures,andmakecomparisonswhererelevant.Writeatleast150words.
Some people say that governments should pay for public health care and education, while others say that it is not the governments' responsibility. Please discuss both views and give your opinion.
Complete the notes below.Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer. History of weather forecastingEarly methods-Almanacs connected the weather with the positions of different【L31】______at particular times.Invention of weather instruments- A hygrometer showed levels of【L32】______(Nicholas Cusa 1450)- Temperature variations first measured by a thermometer containing【L33】______(Galileo Galilei 1593)- A barometer indicated air pressure(Evangelista Torricelli 1643)Transmitting weather information- The use of the【L34】______allowed information to be passedaround the world.- Daily【L35】______were produced by the French from 1863.
Some countries have introduced a law to limit working hours for employees. Why is this kind of law introduced? Do you think it is a positive or negative development?
Do the following statements agree with the claims of the writer in Reading Passage 3?In boxes 31-36 on your answer sheet, writeYES if the statement agrees with the claims of the writerNO if the statement contradicts the claims of the writerNOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this
Complete the summary below.Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the Passage for each answerWrite your answers in boxes 19-23 on your answer sheet.Being located away from the mainland, tourists can attain the resort only by【R19】______in a regular service. Within the resort, transports include trails for walking or tracks for both【R20】______and the beach train. The on-island equipment is old-fashioned which is barely working such as the【R21】______overhead. There is television, radio, an old【R22】______and a small fridge. And you can buy the repellant for【R23】______if you forget to bring some.
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in boxes 36-40 on your answer sheet.
You should spend about 40 minutes on this task. Write about the following topic:It is generally believed that the Internet is an excellent means of communication but some people suggest that it may not be the best place to find information.Discuss both these views and give your own opinion.Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or experience.Write at least 250 words.
Differences between countries are becoming less evident recently. People can see the same films, brands, fashion, advertisements and TV channels. Do the disadvantages of this development outweigh the advantages? (2016-01-09A)
Complete the notes below.Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer. The Argus systemDeveloped by Rob Holman in N. Carolina with other researchers.Research is vital for understanding of【L31】______Matches information from under the water with information from a【L32】______According to S. Jeffress Williams, useful because can makeobservations during a【L33】______ Dr Holman's sand collectionDr H. has samples from every【L34】______Used in teaching students of【L35】______ e.g. US East Coast display: grains from south are small, light-coloured and【L36】______in shape
Complete the notes below.Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer."CV and Interview Skills" SeminarThe speaker suggests that the students use the 【L11】______ when they begin writing resumes.The students should be sure not to keep the CV 【L12】______A 【L13】______cover letter is useful when applying for a job and should be included.The speaker believes the CV should have a beautiful 【L14】______The CV should not have any spelling and grammar 【L15】______The words in a CV can describe your 【L16】______Don't forget to put down a 【L17】______on the CV.
A recent newspaper article reports that a 14-year-old boy, who seriously damaged his school, got a punishment to clean streets instead of being sent to prison. Do you think young criminals should be sent to prison or should alternative forms of punishment be used? (2016-01-14)
Completethetablebelow.WriteNOMORETHANONEWORDforeachanswer.
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below. Keep the Water AwayA Last winter's floods on the rivers of central Europe were among the worst since the Middle Ages, and as winter storms return, the spectre of floods is returning too. Just weeks ago, the river Rhone in south-east France burst its banks, driving 15,000 people from their homes, and worse could be on the way. Traditionally, river engineers have gone for Plan A: get rid of the water fast, draining it off the land and down to the sea in tall-sided rivers re-engineered as high-performance drains. But however big they dug city drains, however wide and straight they made the rivers, and however high they built the banks, the floods kept coming back to taunt them, from the Mississippi to the Danube. And when the floods came, they seemed to be worse than ever. No wonder engineers are turning to Plan B: sap the water's destructive strength by dispersing it into fields, forgotten lakes, flood plains and aquifers.B Back in the days when rivers took a more tortuous path to the sea, flood waters lost impetus and volume while meandering across flood plains and idling through wetlands and inland deltas. But today the water tends to have an unimpeded journey to the sea. And this means that when it rains in the uplands, the water comes down all at once. Worse, whenever we close off more flood plains, the river's flow farther downstream becomes more violent and uncontrollable. Dykes are only as good as their weakest link—and the water will unerringly find it. By trying to turn the complex hydrology of rivers into the simple mechanics of a water pipe, engineers have often created danger where they promised safety, and intensified the floods they meant to end. Take the Rhine, Europe's most engineered river. For two centuries, German engineers have erased its backwaters and cut it off from its flood plain.C Today, the river has lost 7 percent of its original length and runs up to a third faster. When it rains hard in the Alps, the peak flows from several tributaries coincide in the main river, where once they arrived separately. And with four-fifths of the lower Rhine's flood plain barricaded off, the waters rise ever higher. The result is more frequent flooding that does ever-greater damage to the homes, offices and roads that sit on the flood plain. Much the same has happened in the US on the mighty Mississippi, which drains the world's second largest river catchment into the Gulf of Mexico.D The European Union is trying to improve rain forecasts and more accurately model how intense rains swell rivers. That may help cities prepare, but it won't stop the floods. To do that, say hydrologists, you need a new approach to engineering not just rivers, but the whole landscape. The UK's Environment Agency—which has been granted an extra ￡150 million a year to spend in the wake of floods in 2000 that cost the country ￡1 billion—puts it like this: "The focus is now on working with the forces of nature. Towering concrete walls are out, and new wetlands are in." To help keep London's feet dry, the agency is breaking the Thames's banks upstream and reflooding 10 square kilometres of ancient flood plain at Otmoor outside Oxford. Nearer to London it has spent ￡100 million creating new wetlands and a relief channel across 16 kilometres of flood plain to protect the town of Maidenhead, as well as the ancient playing fields of Eton College. And near the south coast, the agency is digging out channels to reconnect old meanders on the river Cuckmere in East Sussex that were cut off by flood banks 150 years ago.E The same is taking place on a much grander scale in Austria, in one of Europe's largest river restorations to date. Engineers are regenerating flood plains along 60 kilometres of the river Drava as it exits the Alps. They are also widening the river bed and channelling it back into abandoned meanders, oxbow lakes and backwaters overhung with willows. The engineers calculate that the restored flood plain can now store up to 10 million cubic metres of flood waters and slow storm surges coming out of the Alps by more than an hour, protecting towns as far downstream as Slovenia and Croatia.F "Rivers have to be allowed to take more space. They have to be turned from flood-chutes into flood-foilers," says Nienhuis. And the Dutch, for whom preventing floods is a matter of survival, have gone furthest. A nation built largely on drained marshes and seabed had the fright of its life in 1993 when the Rhine almost overwhelmed it. The same happened again in 1995, when a quarter of a million people were evacuated from the Netherlands. But a new breed of "soft engineers" wants our cities to become porous, and Berlin is their shining example. Since reunification, the city's massive redevelopment has been governed by tough new rules to prevent its drains becoming overloaded after heavy rains. Harald Kraft, an architect working in the city, says: "We now see rainwater as a resource to be kept rather than got rid of at great cost." A good illustration is the giant Potsdamer Platz, a huge new commercial redevelopment by Daimler Chrysler in the heart of the city.G Los Angeles has spent billions of dollars digging huge drains and concreting river beds to carry away the water from occasional intense storms. The latest plan is to spend a cool $280 million raising the concrete walls on the Los Angeles river by another 2 metres. Yet many communities still flood regularly. Meanwhile this desert city is shipping in water from hundreds of kilometres away in northern California and from the Colorado river in Arizona to fill its taps and swimming pools, and irrigate its green spaces. It all sounds like bad planning. "In LA we receive half the water we need in rainfall, and we throw it away. Then we spend hundreds of millions to import water," says Andy Lipkis, an LA environmentalist, along with citizen groups like Friends of the Los Angeles River and Unpaved LA, want to beat the urban flood hazard and fill the taps by holding onto the city's flood water. And it's not just a pipe dream. The authorities this year launched a $100 million scheme to road-test the porous city in one flood-hit community in Sun Valley. The plan is to catch the rain that falls on thousands of driveways, parking lots and rooftops in the valley. Trees will soak up water from parking lots. Homes and public buildings will capture roof water to irrigate gardens and parks. And road drains will empty into old gravel pits and other leaky places that should recharge the city's underground water reserves. Result: less flooding and more water for the city. Plan B says every city should be porous, every river should have room to flood naturally and every coastline should be left to build its own defences. It sounds expensive and Utopian, until you realise how much we spend trying to drain cities and protect our watery margins—and how bad we are at it.Questions 14-19Reading Passage 2 has seven paragraphs, A-G.Which paragraph contains the following information?Write the correct letter, A-G, in boxes 14-19 on your answer sheet.
Youshouldspendabout20minutesonQuestions1-13,whicharebased,onReadingPassage1below.Cananimalscount?Primeamongbasicnumericalfacultiesistheabilitytodistinguishbetweenalargerandasmallernumber,sayspsychologistElizabethBrannon.Humanscandothiswithease-providingtheratioisbigenough-butdootheranimalssharethisability?Inoneexperiment,rhesusmonkeysanduniversitystudentsexaminedtwosetsofgeometricalobjectsthatappearedbrieflyonacomputermonitor.Theyhadtodecidewhichsetcontainedmoreobjects.Bothgroupsperformedsuccessfullybut,importantly,Brannon'steamfoundthatmonkeys,likehumans,makemoreerrorswhentwosetsofobjectsarecloseinnumber.'Thestudents'performanceendsuplookingjustlikeamonkey's.It'spracticallyidentical,'shesays.Humansandmonkeysaremammals,intheanimalfamilyknownasprimates.Thesearenottheonlyanimalswhosenumericalcapacitiesrelyonratio,however.Thesameseemstoapplytosomeamphibians.PsychologistClaudiaUller'steamtemptedsalamanderswithtwosetsoffruitfliesheldincleartubes.Inaseriesoftrials,theresearchersnotedwhichtubethesalamandersscamperedtowards,reasoningthatiftheyhadacapacitytorecognisenumber,theywouldheadforthelargernumber.Thesalamanderssuccessfullydiscriminatedbetweentubescontaining8and16fliesrespectively,butnotbetween3and4,4and6,or8and12.Soitseemsthatforthesalamanderstodiscriminatebetweentwonumbers,thelargermustbeatleasttwiceasbigasthesmaller.However,theycoulddifferentiatebetween2and3fliesjustaswellasbetween1and2flies,suggestingtheyrecognisesmallnumbersinadifferentwayfromlargernumbers.Furthersupportforthistheorycomesfromstudiesofmosquitofish,whichinstinctivelyjointhebiggestshoal*theycan.AteamattheUniversityofPadovafoundthatwhilemosquitofishcantellthedifferencebetweenagroupcontaining3shoal-matesandagroupcontaining4,theydidnotshowapreferencebetweengroupsof4and5.Theteamalsofoundthatmosquitofishcandiscriminatebetweennumbersupto16,butonlyiftheratiobetweenthefishineachshoalwasgreaterthan2:1.Thisindicatesthatthefish,likesalamanders,possessboththeapproximateandprecisenumbersystemsfoundinmoreintelligentanimalssuchasinfanthumansandotherprimates.Whilethesefindingsarehighlysuggestive,somecriticsarguethattheanimalsmightberelyingonotherfactorstocompletethetasks,withoutconsideringthenumberitself.'Anystudythat'sclaimingananimaliscapableofrepresentingnumbershouldalsobecontrollingforotherfactors,'saysBrannon.Experimentshaveconfirmedthatprimatescanindeedperformnumericalfeatswithoutextraclues,butwhataboutthemoreprimitiveanimals?Toconsiderthispossibility,themosquitofishtestswererepeated,thistimeusingvaryinggeometricalshapesinplaceoffish.Theteamarrangedtheseshapessothattheyhadthesameoverallsurfaceareaandluminanceeventhoughtheycontainedadifferentnumberofobjects.Acrosshundredsoftrialson14differentfish,theteamfoundtheyconsistentlydiscriminated2objectsfrom3.Theteamisnowtestingwhethermosquitofishcanalsodistinguish3geometricobjectsfrom4.Evenmoreprimitiveorganismsmaysharethisability.EntomologistJurgenTautzsentagroupofbeesdownacorridor,attheendofwhichlaytwochambers-onewhichcontainedsugarwater,whichtheylike,whiletheotherwasempty.Totestthebees'numeracy,theteammarkedeachchamberwithadifferentnumberofgeometricalshapes-between2and6.Thebeesquicklylearnedtomatchthenumberofshapeswiththecorrectchamber.Likethesalamandersandfish,therewasalimittothebees'mathematicalprowess-theycoulddifferentiateupto4shapes,butfailedwith5or6shapes.Thesestudiesstilldonotshowwhetheranimalslearntocountthroughtraining,orwhethertheyarebornwiththeskillsalreadyintact.Ifthelatteristrue,itwouldsuggesttherewasastrongevolutionaryadvantagetoamathematicalmind.Proofthatthismaybethecasehasemergedfromanexperimenttestingthemathematicalabilityofthree-andfour-day-oldchicks.Likemosquitofish,chicksprefertobearoundasmanyoftheirsiblingsaspossible,sotheywillalwaysheadtowardsalargernumberoftheirkin.Ifchicksspendtheirfirstfewdayssurroundedbycertainobjects,theybecomeattachedtotheseobjectsasiftheywerefamily.Researchersplacedeachchickinthemiddleofaplatformandshowedittwogroupsofballsofpaper.Next,theyhidthetwopilesbehindscreens,changedthequantitiesandrevealedthemtothechick.Thisforcedthechicktoperformsimplecomputationstodecidewhichsidenowcontainedthebiggestnumberofits"brothers".Withoutanypriorcoaching,thechicksscuttledtothelargerquantityataratewellabovechance.Theyweredoingsomeverysimplearithmetic,claimtheresearchers.Whytheseskillsevolvedisnothardtoimagine,sinceitwouldhelpalmostanyanimalforageforfood.Animalsontheprowlforsustenancemustconstantlydecidewhichtreehasthemostfruit,orwhichpatchofflowerswillcontainthemostnectar.Therearealsoother,lessobvious,advantagesofnumeracy.Inonecompellingexample,researchersinAmericafoundthatfemalecootsappeartocalculatehowmanyeggstheyhavelaid-andaddanyinthenestlaidbyanintruder-beforemakinganydecisionsaboutaddingtothem.Exactlyhowancienttheseskillsareisdifficulttodetermine,however.Onlybystudyingthenumericalabilitiesofmoreandmorecreaturesusingstandardisedprocedurescanwehopetounderstandthebasicpreconditionsfortheevolutionofnumber.*agroupoffishQuestions1-7Completethetablebelow.ChooseNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSfromthepassageforeachanswer.Writeyouranswersinboxes1-7onyouranswersheet.
Completetheflow-chartbelow.WriteNOMORETHANTHREEWORDSforeachanswer.
Complete the form below.Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.Moving Company Service ReportExample AnswerFull Name: Jane BondPhone Number: 【L1】______USA Address: 509, 【L2】______1137, 【L3】______in SeattlePacking Day: 【L4】______Date: 11th MarchClean-up by: 5:00 p.m.Day: 【L5】______About the Price: Most expensiveStorage Time: 【L6】______
Which attitude is associated with the following people during the conversation?Choose SIX answers from the box and write the correct letter, A-H, next to questions 21-26.AttitudesA amusedB criticalC forgetfulD impatientE politeF relaxedG sympatheticH unrealisticPeople
You should spend about 20 minutes on this task. You have an English-speaking friend who lives in another country. His son has a short vacation before going to college. Write a letter to your friend. In your letter, invite your friend's son to come to your city introduce some interesting places to visit say something about the weather in the city you live Write at least 150 words.
Choose the correct letter, A, B, C or D.Write the correct letter in boxes 38-40 on your answer sheet.