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Variant 3. Exercise 1. Choose the best answer, (a, b, c d or e) according to the text. Technological progress. Exercise 2. Read the text. A) look at the first two paragraphs. There are six mistakes underlined. Correct them and say why they are wrong.
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Variant 3
Exercise 1. Choose the best answer, (a, b, c d or e) according to the text.
TECHNOLOGICAL PROGRESS
Over the past thirty years or so the quality of many people's lives has deteriorated in some respects because of technological progress. Those people living near airports are constantly assailed by the noise of increasingly larger and more powerful jet aircraft taking off and landing. We have ugly buildings which have sprung up in towns and cities. Some of these are blocks of flats-high-rise buildings built because of the high price of land, which seem more like breeding boxes than houses where people have space to live. Worse still, much of our building effort has been channeled into the construction of more and more large office blocks at the expense of much needed housing for the growing urban population.
1. It's obvious in the passage that ----.
a) the quality of people's lives has declined by technology
b) those people living around airports are happy with their condition
c) technology progressed the life standards
d) airports are usually constructed in urban areas
e) people want to live near airports
2. We have ugly buildings ----.
a) so we need to improve technology
b) because the land is expensive
c) but we don't have much complaint about it
d) where people find enough space to live
e) which have appeared only in rural areas
3. Technological progress ----.
a) has negative effects on people's lives
b) requires more large office blocks
c) became much faster than expected
d) enabled people to live in large blocks
e) force us to find ways to own land
Exercise 2. Read the text. a) Look at the first two paragraphs. There are six mistakes underlined. Correct them and say why they are wrong.
b) Look at the rest of the text. There are eight more mistakes. Find them and correct them.
THE THREE MOST SIGNIFICANT TECHNOLOGICAL DEVELOPMENTS OF THE PAST CENTURY
The past hundred years see enormous developments in technology. These are often labour saving and have made our lives much easier in many ways. Morover, they have also driven many dramatic changes in our society.
It could be argue that one of the most important advances is one which we now all take for granted, the telephone. It is now difficult to imagine a life where contacting someone involved seeing them face to face or writing them letter, which would be take days, or possibly weeks to reach them. Furthermore, in these days of mobile phones, the equipments needed to call someone has become so small and portable, that it seems to be only a step away from telepathic.
The second technological development that has had far-reaching consequences, is the computer; and the information technology revolution. The majority people in the developed world can use the Internet and email to easily access a news, any informations, or get an advice on everything from medical to financial problems.
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Another development that has been of great social significance the washing machine.
Prior to this, washing clothes was a major household chore, and was one reason why women were trapped in the home and unlikely to be able to have a career. With the advent of such labour saving devices, women had more freedom to choose to have a career as well as a family. They often say that this has had a very destabilizing effect on families, but it has also enabled many women to have satisfing careers, and I feel on balance, has been a very positive force in society.
Although many other advances could say to be significance, in my opinion these three are the ones which have changed society the most.
Exercise 3. Check your knowledge giving a term to the description, the figure in the brackets means the number of the letters in the word.
1. Name for the North Star (7)
2. A pollution-mixed fog (4)
3. Famous physicist who developed theory of relativity (8)
4. Computer device; rodent (5)
5. Precious metal, chemical symbol Ag (6)
6. The programs used by a computer (8)
7. The vehicle providing power for a train (10)
8. Smallest unit of a chemical element (4)
9. Instrument to make very small objects appear larger (10)
10. The scientific institute looking for intelligent life in the universe (acronym) (4)
MODULE 5. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROBLEMS OF MODERN SOCIETY. CHALLENGES OF YOUNG PEOPLE
PART 1 PRACTICE YOUR READING AND CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS
Text 1
1. Read and translate the text using a dictionary if needed.
THE POLICE HAVE A DUTY TO EVERY HOUSEHOLDER
Matthew’s 21 and has been living in a ‘bash’ for six months. His parents don’t know where he is. His girlfriend, Nicky, is younger and three months pregnant. The ‘bash’ is built from planks and crates, roofed with old rugs and plastic sheeting and raised off the ground with wooden pallets. The nearest running water is in a nearby church hall. There’s no electricity. Matthew and Nicky don’t go hungry. A mobile kitchen brings soup and rolls every night. Students from King’s College, across the river, regularly bring food. On the face of it - a brave face - they wouldn’t give up this life for anything. They don’t bother with the dole. Matthew candidly says that it’s a waste of time when they can make do by begging in the West End. It’s this that brings them into conflict with us. Matthew talks about Paul and Charlie, both officers at nearby Kennington Road Police Station. “Paul’s caught me begging once, he gave me a warning, ” Matthew says. “But if he catches me again he’ll do me. ” Paul puts the other point of view. “Some people think the Vagrancy Act is obsolete and should be scrapped. But while it’s there, we have to enforce it. And we have to think of the nuisance to other people. ” Indeed, most commuters find the beggars and their dogs frightening. Many think the police should evict the vagrants and clear away the ‘bashes’. But the fact is that we owe a duty to these citizens too. Our real work with the ‘bashdwellers’ is not the cat and mouse game of trying to catch them with their palms out. It’s the work the public never see: helping to get someone a hospital bed. Encouraging those who need to visit drug and alcohol rehabilitation centres. Directing newly homeless people to hostels and free kitchens. Putting our heads together with social workers, housing officers, welfare and benefits offices and voluntary organisations. It’s spending hours talking to homeless people finding out about their lives and their problems. Where they’ve come from. If their families know where they are. And persuading the young ones to return home. “We’ll try to give them the respect that every Londoner is entitled to, ” Paul says. Partly as a result of his help, Nicky and Matthew have reached the end of their life on the road. They’re moving to a flat before their baby is born. Reading this you may be in local government, a social worker, architect, counselor, teacher, or anyone with an interest in the plight of the homeless. If you would like to know more about how we can work together to ease the problems of homelessness, please call the Metropolitan Police 0800 662244.
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