IeltsRead by fer jan

Academic Reading Workbook

Copyright page The National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research (NCELTR) was established at Macquarie University in 1988. The National Centre forms part of the Linguistics and Psychology discipline at Macquarie University. This workbook is sold subject to the conditions that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic mechanical photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher. The publishers have used their best efforts to contact all copyright holders for permission to reproduce artwork and text extracts and wish to acknowledge the following for providing copyright permission. Text used in Step 6, adapted by Clutterbuck, Michael, from Savage, C.M., 1996, Fifth Generation Management, revised ed., Newton, MA: Butterworth Heinemann: ‘Principles of management in the computer age.’ Text used in Practice Reading test adapted by Dash, Anna with permission from Guterl, Fred, ‘The Future of TV’, Newsweek ‘Issues 2003’ Special Edition, Dec 2002 - Feb 2003, pp.86 - 89. www.newsweek.com Text used in Steps 3, 4, 6, 7 written for this course by Dash, Anna, ‘The Use of Comics in Education’ 2003. Text used in Steps 5, 6, 8 adapted with permission from Ezzell, Carol, 2003, ‘Clocking Cultures’, Scientiﬁc American Journal, September, pp. 56-57. www.sciam.com Text used in Steps 5, 6,7 written for this course by Fitchett, John, ‘The Rush’ 2004. Text used adapted with permission from Garbutt, Michael and Kerry Sullivan, ‘Culture and Learning’, IELTS Practice Tests, Sydney: NCELTR, Macquarie University, 1996, p. 31. www.nceltr.mq.edu.au/publications Text used in Steps 5, 6, 8 adapted with permission from Gibbs, 2002, W. W., ‘Endangered Languages’, Scientiﬁc American, July, p. 79. www.sciam.com Texts used from O’Sullivan, Kerry and Jere my Lindeck, 2002, Focusing on IELTS: Reading and Writing Skills, Sydney: NCELTR, Macquarie University: ‘Cats’, ‘Esperanto’, ‘Migrant Labour’. www.nceltr.mq.edu.au/publications Text used in Steps 4, 5, 8 written for this course by Thompson, Bruce, ‘Treating a disease or inventing one? ’ 2004. Text used in Practice Reading test written for this course by Thompson, Bruce, ‘Good for you or not good for you? That is the question’ 2004. Text used in Practice Reading test written for this course by Thompson, Bruce, ‘Sensory Overload’ 2004. © Macquarie University 2005

Design by Stephen Macchia, Centre for Flexibile Learning, Macquarie University Published by the National Centre for English Language Teaching and Research Macquarie University Sydney NSW 2109

Welcome to the Academic Reading Workbook! What is the Academic Reading Workbook? The Academic Reading Workbook is a collection of all the workbook activities in the Reading Module, which are indicated by the following icon: The workbook also contains the reading passages for workbook activities.

How is it useful? The Academic Reading Workbook is a very important part of the course, as it gives you a more realistic test experience. It allows you to read passages and practise answering IELTS Reading test questions as you will in the test - on paper. We strongly encourage you to download the complete workbook all at one time, and keep it next to your computer so that you can refer to it whenever you encounter a workbook activity.

How do I use it? When you encounter a workbook activity, look for the workbook activity number. For the activity to the right, the workbook activity number is 3.1 You can then turn to your Activities Section of the Table of Contents at the front of the workbook to locate the page number of that activity.

Step 3 3.1 Skimming a passage

...2

To ďŹ nd the reading passage you need, turn to the Passages Sections of the Table of Contents to ďŹ nd the page number for the passage. If you would like to repeat a workbook activity at any time during the course, you can print off the page individually. To do this simply click on the Print Page button on screen. If you would like a clean copy of a reading passage, you can follow the same process above. Alternatively, you can click on the Reading Passage button on screen and print the passage in the popup box.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Read the instructions on your screen carefully before you begin each workbook activity. After you have completed the activity in your workbook, return to the screen and click on the Check button to check your answers.

We hope you enjoy your workbook!

Table of Contents Step 3 3.1 Skimming a passage 3.2 Scanning to answer Short Answer questions 3.3 More scanning practice to answer Short Answer questions 3.4 Reading intensively for detail to answer T/F/NG questions 3.5 Reading intensively for detail to answer Sentence Completion questions

...2 ...3 ...4 ...5 ...6

Step 4 4.1 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 1 4.2 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 2 4.3 Multiple Choice Paragraph Headings questions

...8 ...9 ...10

Step 5 5.1 ModiďŹ ed Multiple Choice questions 5.2 Standard and ModiďŹ ed Multiple Choice questions 5.3 Information Location questions 1 5.4 Information Location questions 2 5.5 True/False/Not Given Questions 2 and 3 5.6 True/False/Not Given questions 1 5.7 True/False/Not Given questions 2

...12 ...13 ...14 ...15 ...16 ...17 ...18

Step 6 6.1 Summary Completion questions with a box of possible answers 1 6.2 Summary Completion questions using a box of possible answers 2 6.3 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 1 6.4 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 2

...20 ...21 ...22 ...23

Step 7 7.1 Putting it all together

...26

Step 8 8.1 Yes/ No/Not Given questions 8.2 Yes/ No/Not Given questions 8.3 Matching Viewpoint questions 8.4 Matching Viewpoint questions

...28 ...29 ...30 ...31

Language Focus Part 3 Using punctuation to answer IELTS Reading test questions

...34

Final Practice Reading test Reading Passage 1 Reading Passage 2 Reading Passage 3

...36 ...39 ...42

Reading Passages P1 Cats P2 Clocking Cultures P3 Culture and Learning P4 Endangered Languages P5 Esperanto P6 Health Effects of Systemic Poisons P7 Migrant Labour P8 Principles of Management in the Computer Age P9 The Rush P10 Treating a Disease or Inventing One? P11 The Use of Comics in Education

...46 ...47 ...49 ...50 ...52 ...53 ...54 ...55 ...56 ...58 ...60

Step 3 3.1 Skimming a passage 3.2 Scanning to answer Short Answer questions 3.3 More scanning practice to answer Short Answer questions 3.4 Reading intensively for detail to answer T/F/NG questions 3.5 Reading intensively for detail to answer Sentence Completion questions

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Academic Reading Workbook

3.1 Skimming a passage Let’s now practise the skimming process by skimming all the paragraphs of the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11) using the four-step skimming process. 3.1

Use a pencil to skim the passage. Underline the key words and write the main idea of each paragraph next to the paragraph.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

When you have ﬁnished, click on the Student Notes button to compare how you skimmed the passage with how Anthony skimmed the passage. Anthony’s answer is a good example of how to skim this passage. You may have underlined or circled different words, which is ﬁne. However, notice the words Anthony underlined as they are important.

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Academic Reading Workbook

3.2 Scanning to answer Short Answer questions 3.2

Letâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s now practise the scanning process by answering two more questions on the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11). Use a pencil to help you and scan the passage in your workbook for the answers. Time yourself. You should take no more than two minutes to answer these two questions.

Questions 2-3 Answer the following questions using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. 2 Where were painted friezes found? ........................................................................ 3 When were classic comics available? ........................................................................

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Academic Reading Workbook

3.3 More scanning practice to answer Short Answer questions 3.3

Scan the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11). Write your answers below. Time yourself. You should take no longer than three minutes to scan for the following answers.

Questions 4-6 Answer the following questions using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. 4 Who is the Marketing Director of Warp Graphics? .......................................................................... 5 What organisation uses comics to motivate children? .................................................................... 6 Who wrote ‘Comics and Reading Choices’. (2 names) ...................................................................

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Academic Reading Workbook

3.4 Reading intensively for detail to answer T/F/NG questions 3.4

Let’s now practise the process for reading intensively for detail by answering three more T/F/NG questions on the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11). Use a pencil to help you scan the passage and to read intensively for detail to answer the questions below. Time yourself. You should take no more than three minutes to answer these three questions.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember you have already underlined and circled important words and written the main idea next to each paragraph. This will help you identify which paragraph to scan to locate where an answer is found.

Questions 2-4 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? 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

2 Paintings at Lascaux were accompanied by written inscriptions.

................

3 Comics were thought to be detrimental to a child’s reading progress.

................

4 Violence was the only reason that comics were criticised.

................

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Academic Reading Workbook

3.5 Reading intensively for detail to answer Sentence Completion questions Let’s now practise the reading intensively for detail process by answering more Sentence Completion questions on the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11). Use a pencil to help you scan the passage and to read intensively for detail to answer the questions.

3.5

Time yourself. You should take no longer than four to ﬁve minutes to answer the following questions.

Questions 1-5 Complete each sentence with the correct ending A-H from the box below. 1 Some early forms of sequential art

................

2 Recently, ideas about comics

................

3 Reading projects using comic libraries

................

4 Superhero comics

................

5 Specially-designed comics

................

A B C D E F G H

were all used in religious ceremonies. have been used in a university science class. have been judged to be especially violent. have been warmly received by children. were popular reading in the 19th century. were used as an aid to help the illiterate. have been produced by governments. have been re-evaluated.

Step 4 4.1 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 1 4.2 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 2 4.3 Multiple Choice Paragraph Headings questions

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Academic Reading Workbook

4.1 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 1 Complete the Matching Paragraph Headings questions for Paragraphs C, D and E of the passage Culture and Learning (P3). 4.1

Questions 1-5 The reading passage has ďŹ ve paragraphs labelled A-E. Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below. Write the appropriate number (i-x) in boxes 1-5 on your answer sheet. i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x.

Cultural differences in writing styles Primary and secondary school education Implications for overseas students Academic writing styles International languages Variation within cultures Variations in subjects taught Tertiary education Cultural variation in learning between cultures Changes in the British education system

1 Paragraph A

................

2 Paragraph B

................

3 Paragraph C

..................

4 Paragraph D

..................

5 Paragraph E

..................

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4.2 Matching Paragraph Headings questions 2 Skim the passage. When you have ﬁnished, return to the screen and complete the Matching Paragraph Headings questions for the passage Treating a Disease or Inventing One? (P10) 4.2

Questions 1-8 The reading passage has ﬁve paragraphs labelled A-E. Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below.

i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x. xi.

Consequences of ADHD for parents and children Opposition to chemical treatment of ADHD sufferers Commonly asked questions ADHD or normal behaviour? Variations of acceptable behaviour in children An invented mental illness Current treatments only a temporary solution A questionable treatment Common signs of an ADHD sufferer Using ADHD to sell drugs The deﬁnition of an average child

Paragraph A

..................

Paragraph B

..................

Paragraph C

..................

Paragraph D

..................

Paragraph E

..................

Paragraph F

..................

Paragraph G

..................

Paragraph H

..................

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Academic Reading Workbook

4.3 Multiple Choice Paragraph Headings questions Complete the Multiple Choice Paragraph Headings questions for the passage Culture and Learning (P3). 4.3

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

Questions 1-2 Choose the correct letter A, B, C, or D. 1 Which of the following headings is the most appropriate for Paragraph D? A

Cultural differences in writing styles

Subject-speciﬁc variations

Variation within cultures

Implications for overseas students

2 Which of the following headings is the most appropriate for Paragraph E?

Cultural differences in learning styles

Entrance to subject-speciﬁc discipline

Secondary to tertiary variations

Implications for overseas students

Step 5 5.1 Modiﬁed Multiple Choice questions 5.2 Standard and Modiﬁed Multiple Choice questions 5.3 Information Location questions 1 5.4 Information Location questions 2 5.5 True/False/Not Given Questions 2 and 3 5.6 True/False/Not Given questions 1 5.7 True/False/Not Given questions 2

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.1 Modified Multiple Choice questions Read an extract of the passage Health Effects of Systemic Poisons (P6) and complete the ModiďŹ ed Multiple Choice questions below.

Questions 2-3 5.1

Choose TWO letters A-E. Which TWO of the following are results of consuming non-soluble poisons?

fecal blood

digestive system

mucous-producing glands

lower intestine

diarrhoea

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.2 Standard and Modified Multiple Choice questions Read the ﬁrst ﬁve paragraphs of the reading passage The Rush (P9) and answer the two Multiple Choice questions below.

Question 1 5.2

Choose THREE letters A-F. 1 Which THREE problems do doctors use adrenaline for? A

poor sports performance

pain

stress

reduced concentration

inability to sleep

lack of energy

Question 2 Choose the correct letter A, B, C or D. 2 Extreme sports can be addictive because they A

are physically challenging

push individuals mentally

stimulate adrenaline production

encourage personal discovery.

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.3 Information Location questions 1 Read the passage Clocking Cultures (P2) and answer the following Information Location questions.

Questions 1-6 The passage has eight paragraphs labelled A-H. Which paragraph contains the following information?

5.3

NB You may use any letter more than once. 1 examples of how time is measured 2 a comparison of time expectations based on hierarchy 3 a cultural explanation of different perceptions of time 4 an analysis of the connection between time and work 5 effects of time on the perception of time 6 a recommendation of how to deal with different understandings of time

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.4 Information Location questions 2 Read the passage Treating a Disease or Inventing One? (P10) again and answer the following Information Location questions.

Questions 1-6 The passage has eight paragraphs labeled A-H. Which paragraph contains the following information?

5.4

NB You may use any letter more than once. 1 an example of different interpretations of acceptable behaviour 2 a description of everyday activities which indicate ADHD 3 an assertion that ADHD characteristics represent normal behaviour 4 reasons to reject the controversial ADHD drug treatment 5 an explanation of common misconceptions concerning ADHD medication 6 an analysis of why alternative treatments to drugs are often avoided

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.5 True/False/Not Given Questions 2 and 3 Use the process to answer True/False/Not Given Questions 2 and 3 below. 5.5 Read the passage Endangered languages (P4) again and answer the True/False/Not Given questions below.

Questions 1-3 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? 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

1 Krauss predicted that a very high percentage of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s languages would become extinct. .................... 2 There is evidence that the merging of languages helps international business. .................... 3 One expert believes that when a language dies, its culture dies too. ....................

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.6 True/False/Not Given questions 1 Read the passage The Rush (P9) again and answer the True/False/Not Given questions below.

Questions 1-5 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? 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

5.6

1 Alfred Ryan believes that people learn to conquer their fears through continuing to do extreme sports. .................... 2 Bernard worries that he wouldn’t be a good husband. .................... 3 Bernard’s training can prevent all unpredictable events except bad weather. .................... 4 Bernard thinks that a short and dangerous life is better than a long but boring one. .................... 5 Bernard’s team would only regret an expedition if his team suffered a tragedy. ....................

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Academic Reading Workbook

5.7 True/False/Not Given questions 2 Read the passage Treating a Disease or Inventing One? (P10) again and answer the True/False/ Not Given questions below. Remember to skim the passage before you answer the questions.

Questions 1-5 Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? Write: 5.7

TRUE

if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE

if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN

if there is no information on this

1 Brain function of ADHD sufferers is different to that of other people. ................... 2 Bryant claims that children who are put on drugs to help their ADHD become addicted to illegal drugs later in life. ................... 3 Professor Mitchell believes that ADHD is a convenient label for problems with other causes. ................... 4 In some countries, the disorder of ADHD is not known. ................... 5 The author believes that other methods should be used to help some children with behavioural problems. ...................

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Step 6 6.1 Summary Completion questions with a box of possible answers 1 6.2 Summary Completion questions with a box of possible answers 2 6.3 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 1 6.4 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 2

Academic Reading Workbook

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6.1 Summary Completion questions with a box of possible answers 1 Read the passage The Rush (P9) again and complete the Summary Completion questions below.

6.1

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

Questions 1-6 Complete the following summary using words from the box. An increasing number of people are becoming addicted to extreme sports, performing death defying feats for 1.................................. This natural high is caused by adrenaline released into the 2.................................. to help the body deal with 3.................................. When this chemical begins circulating throughout the body, a person experiences an increase in 4................................., awareness and concentration. 5.................................. can make extreme sports enthusiasts such as Bernard Peters push themselves further for the excitement and high it gives them. Peters and others recognise that there are drawbacks to such hazardous pursuits. They require time, money and an acceptance of the 6.................................. involved. However, participants ﬁnd the experiences rewarding and worth the risks involved.

scientiﬁc discovery danger blood

adrenaline risky feats adrenal glands

power sudden changes stress

the rush

stressful situation

energy

Academic Reading Workbook

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6.2 Summary Completion questions using a box of possible answers 2 Read the passage Principles of Management in the Computer Age (P8) and complete the Summary Completion questions below.

6.2

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

Questions 1-6 Complete the summary of the ﬁrst four paragraphs (A-D) of the reading passage Principles of Management in the Computer Age using words from the box. The principles of management used in the past are not suitable for the 1........................... While in the past steep triangular management systems were common, there is now an emergence in 2.......................... using 3.......................... and human contact. Modern 4.......................... allows people to share information and build businesses. However, 5.......................... becomes very important with individuals making their own 6.......................... within the boundaries of a common plan.

teams ﬂatter network organisations networking technology working in teams challenges decisions

industrial-era triangular management systems technical infrastructure Internet technology computer systems computer age

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Academic Reading Workbook

6.3 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 1 Read the passage Clocking Cultures (P2) again and complete the Summary Completion questions below.

6.3

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

If you are having trouble answering the Summary Completion questions, click on the Hint buttons on the screen.

Questions 1-4 Complete the summary using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage. Different societies often have different views on time. These views can indicate each societiesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; 1.........................................................., as well as the way they see the world. The differences in 2.......................................................... in various cultures have been documented. This means that each culture has its own unspoken language and understanding of the rules of 3............................. ........................... These different rules explain why it is acceptable in some cultures to keep certain people waiting and why it is considered rude to do so in others, leading to 4...................................... .................... between people of different cultures.

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Academic Reading Workbook

6.4 Summary Completion questions without a box of possible answers 2 Read the passage Endangered Languages (P4) again and complete the Summary Completion questions below.

6.4

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

Questions 1-7 Complete the summary using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the passage. Some linguists have predicted that half of the world’s languages will disappear in the next hundred years due to 1..................................................... resorting to speaking the dominant language. This 2..................................................... boosts the social and economic status of 3............................... ....................... However, it is a great loss to the linguistic study of the limits of human speech, the study of ancient migration patterns and to the diversity of cultures. Other linguists have claimed that these studies usually focus on the 4......................................... ............, rather than whether the speakers of the language were actively using and teaching the language to their offspring, ensuring its survival. When speakers doubt 5..................................... ........... of their language, it is more likely to disappear because if people view their language as insigniﬁcant, they stop using it. The solution to the problem of 6..................................................... is for people to speak two or more languages. This is common in many parts of the world, however, in North America, Australia and Russia, people react negatively to other languages being spoken in front of them. This has lead to these parts of the world being where languages are dying the fastest. To save these languages the world’s 7..................................................... must be convinced to let the minorities speak in their own languages.

Step 7 7.1 Putting it all together

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Academic Reading Workbook

7.1 Putting it all together Read the passage The Rush (P9) again and answer the Viewpoint Questions 1-10 below.

Questions 1-3 Choose the letter A-C that most closely describes the writer’s viewpoint for each question. 1 Professor Vice states that adrenaline

7.1

assists the body in dealing with stressful situations

prevents people from being attacked

helps sports people perform beyond their physical and psychological abilities.

2 According to Ryan, addiction to extreme sports results from A

the feeling of euphoria caused by the release of adrenaline into the blood

overcoming natural barriers to fear

pursuing increasingly risky sports.

3 Bernard Peters believes that A

pursuing extreme sports is preferable to getting married

extreme sports are as risky as crossing the road

everything in life requires people to take risks.

Questions 4-8 Do the following statements reﬂect the viewpoint of the writer? Write: TRUE

if the statement agrees with the writer

FALSE

if the statement contradicts the writer

NOT GIVEN

if there is no information about this in the passage

4 People participate in extreme sports in order to benefit scientific research. .................. 5 With careful planning and training, extreme sports are relatively safe. .................. 6 Safety equipment, transport and accommodation are often difficult to organise. .................. 7 It is possible for almost anyone to participate in extreme sports. .................. 8 It is inevitable that more mountaineers will lose their lives Everest. .................. 26

Step 8 8.1 Yes/No/Not Given questions 1 8.2 Yes/No/Not Given questions 2 8.3 Matching Viewpoint questions 1 8.4 Matching Viewpoint questions 2

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Academic Reading Workbook

8.1 Yes/ No/Not Given questions 1 Read the passage Cats (P1) again and answer Questions 1-5 below.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

8.1

Questions 1-5 Do the following statements reďŹ&#x201A;ect the statements made by the writer? Write: YES

if the statement agrees with the writer

if the statement contradicts the writer

NOT GIVEN

if there is no information about this in the passage

1 The large number of plants in gardens has helped to increase the bird population. .................. 2 The activity of predators, such as lions, causes extinction of other animals. .................. 3 Other animals eat more birds than cats. .................. 4 Cats are a particular problem in Victoria. .................. 5 There are more birds per kilometre in towns and cities than in a forest environment. ..................

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8.2 Yes/ No/Not Given questions 2 Read the passage Treating a Disease or Inventing One? (P10) again and answer Questions 1-5 below.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

8.2

Questions 1-5 Do the following statements reďŹ&#x201A;ect the statements made by the writer? Write: YES

if the statement agrees with the writer

if the statement contradicts the writer

NOT GIVEN

if there is no information about this in the passage

1 Professor Jane Mitchell believes all children suffer from ADHD at some stage. .................. 2 Parents can prevent ADHD by educating their children properly. .................. 3 Drug treatment leading to later substance abuse is a myth according to Professor Jane Mitchell. .................. 4 The writer thinks diagnosing children with ADHD is the easy solution but that other solutions should be explored. .................. 5 ADHD does not exist in Melanesian societies. ..................

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8.3 Matching Viewpoint questions 1 Read the passage Endangered Languages (P4) again and answer Questions 1-3 below.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

8.3

Questions 1-3 Look at the following people and the list of viewpoints below. Match each person with the viewpoint that they express.

A B C D

Patrick McConvell Michael Krauss James Matisoff Douglas Whalen

1 3,000 languages will die out in the next hundred years.

............................

2 Knowledge of culture is lost when a language ceases to be used.

............................

3 Not all predictions regarding languages have been correct.

............................

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8.4 Matching Viewpoint questions 2 Read the passage Clocking Cultures (P2) again and answer Questions 1-4 below.

IMPORTANT NOTE Remember to review the Process on the screen before you begin the reading activity.

8.4

Questions 1-4 Look at the following people and the list of viewpoints below. Match each person with the viewpoint that they express.

A B C D

Robert Levine Edward Hall Jr. Ziauddin Sardar Kevin Birth

1 Misunderstandings between different cultures can be caused by different perceptions of time. ............................ 2 How time is valued shows what is important to different cultures. ............................ 3 There is a relationship between power and waiting time. ............................ 4 Not all cultures view time as past, present and future. ............................

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Language Focus Part 3 Using punctuation to answer IELTS Reading Test questions

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Academic Reading Workbook

Using punctuation to answer IELTS Reading Test questions Read the ﬁrst three paragraphs from the passage The Use of Comics in Education (P11) again and circle all the punctuation marks as you read. Notice how the punctuation marks are used. Use this to help you answer the T/F/NG questions.

Questions 1-6

Language Focus Part 3

Do the following statements agree with the information given in the passage? 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

1 Sequential art is a group of drawings that depict a story. ............................. 2 Sequential art was no longer used after writing was invented. ............................ 3 ‘Friezes’ are a form of written inscription. ............................ 4 Sequential art was used in Egypt and Europe so that the illiterate could participate in religious activities. ............................ 5 Warp Graphics publishes comics. ............................ 6 Catherine L. Kouns states that comics hinder children’s literary skills. ............................

Final Practice Reading test Reading Passage 1 Reading Passage 2 Reading Passage 3

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Academic Reading Workbook

READING PASSAGE 1 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading Passage 1.

Questions 1-5 The passage has eight paragraphs A-H. Choose the correct heading for paragraphs C-H from the list of headings below. Write the correct number i-x in boxes 1-5 on your Answer Sheet.

Final Practice Reading test

i. ii. iii. iv. v. vi. vii. viii. ix. x.

A healthier option Asian countries know best Fast food companies go healthy A growing business Importance of good eating habits Mixed messages A return to dairy products Healthy becomes unhealthy Allergies to dairy Concern over negative reaction to mixed messages

1 Paragraph C

..............

2 Paragraph D

..............

3 Paragraph E

..............

4 Paragraph G

..............

5 Paragraph H

..............

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Good for you or not good for you? That is the question. A At no time in history has the world’s population ever been so well-informed about nutrition and health. Consumers in the developed world are constantly bombarded with advertising messages which promote the health benefits of a wide range of food products. However, they are also exposed to the constant promotion of junk food as well. Fast food companies have become sensitive to the criticisms they face over the potential damage their food causes and have begun to vigorously defend the nutritional value of the meals they serve. With this constant flow of messages – often contradictory – how are today’s consumers supposed to determine precisely what is healthy to eat? B According to nutritionist Susan McCaskill, many people today intend to eat healthily, but have become confused about how to do so. “It is not just that the traditional definitions of a healthy diet have changed, though this is certainly significant. Many grew up being told that the more milk you drank, the healthier you would be. Then dairy foods became ‘bad’ in the eyes of many health professionals and many people sought alternatives to it. Now these alternatives are coming under the same sort of criticism.” C The alternative McCaskill is referring to is soya milk. A generation of consumers who were labeled allergic to cow’s milk products embraced soya substitutes enthusiastically. In fact, the soya bean itself was promoted as a kind of miracle food overall. Claims were made it had the potential to not only provide all the protein required for a healthy diet, but that it could prevent heart disease and cancer. Slogans such as “It’s Soy Good for you...” began to appear in nutritional advice columns. Final Practice Reading test

D Now suddenly you can find messages on health-related websites claiming “It’s not soy good” and even “It’s SOY bad for you.” A generation of health-conscious eaters who previously abandoned milk products for soy are now worried and confused. The same chemicals (known as isoflavones) in soya beans which were claimed to fight cancer and other diseases are now listed as the cause of some cancers, and are also implicated in hormonal problems and thyroid gland disorders. Dr David Steinman of the Eastern Sydney University Medical School considers the praise of soya products in many alternative health circles to be without scientific foundation. “Soya proponents suggest we look to the health statistics of Asian countries as proof of the benefits of soy. When we look closely at the countries where soya products are consumed regularly, it is clear that though they are widely used, they are also eaten in very moderate quantities. Many people seeking a healthy diet today are eating ten times that much soy, particularly through drinking vast amounts of soya milk and eating other nontraditional foods such as soya-based ice-cream.” E Susan McCaskill considers the latest negative publicity about soy to be exaggerated, but she admits that it does raise some very relevant questions. “It still appears to me that soya beans have many notable nutritional benefits to offer, but the key thing here is moderation. What frequently happens now is that people go from eating much too much of one thing to eating too much of something else.” F Both McCaskill and Steinman concede that the recent soya controversy is just one example of how food fashions are confusing the health-conscious today. Red meat has often been blamed for high rates of heart disease and other health problems, then has been praised for its high iron content. Carbohydrate rich foods such as pasta, rice and potatoes have been promoted since the seventies as healthy staples of our diet, and then recently have received the blame for the growing numbers of people who are seriously overweight. G Dr Steinman echoes the words of McCaskill on one key point - moderation is the most significant factor in any healthy diet. However, he fears that modern obsessions with perfect food habits can simply leave people so discouraged that they give up completely. “If you rush to a new diet because you’ve been told your old one was bad, then find the new one has its own critics, what do you do next? I worry that many will simply stop thinking about healthy eating habits and head to the nearest fast food outlet.” H It is certainly undeniable that the fast food industry is booming. Whether this is because of confused and discouraged eaters of health food is difficult to determine. What is clear, however, is that advertisers are working harder and harder to influence the world’s eating habits, and that the needs of both health enthusiasts and fast food customers are now coming together: the fastest growing customer base in many major fast food chains is now people attracted by their new “healthy choices.” The question remains: who will decide in the end precisely what a healthy choice is? © Copyright Macquarie University 2005

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Questions 6-10 Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1? In boxes 6-10 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

6 Fast food companies admit that the food they serve is unhealthy. 7 Soy products have been proven to stop certain illnesses. 8 Some health-conscious people are overconsuming certain foods. 9 One health expert worries that frustration might stop people maintaining a good diet.

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10 Fast food advertising will increasingly inﬂuence what people think is healthy.

Questions 11-13 Choose the correct letters A, B or C. Write the correct letter in boxes 11-13 on your Answer Sheet. 11 People are unsure about what is considered healthy because A B C

dairy foods are now considered unhealthy the healthier replacements to unhealthy foods are being criticised junk food is promoted as being healthy.

12 According to the article, soya can be considered healthy because A B C

it has been found to be a miracle food it doesn’t promote allergies as dairy products do healthy people in Asia eat it in average amounts.

13 The main reason for the increase in fast food customers is A B C

the option of healthier food effective advertising confusion about healthy food choices.

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READING PASSAGE 2 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-27 which are based on Reading Passage 2.

Sensory Overload Are you suﬀering from a feeling of annoyance? Does life seem to get more and more irritating all the time? Do you struggle day to day just to stay calm and clear-headed in the face of more and more frustrating experiences? If your answer to these questions is “YES,” you are not alone. In fact, you are part of a growing trend that demonstrates the signiﬁcance of the small events which annoy us on a day to day basis.

According to psychologist Maurice Penman, inhabitants of today’s modern cities face a far more aggressive range of sensory experiences than ever before. “It is not simply that the pace of life is faster in today’s world, or that people are under more pressure at work. Of course, both those things are true. But today people are exposed to a greater number of both visual and auditory stimuli. Basically, this means we are being asked to both look at and listen to far more than we ever have been before.”

However, Penman is quick to point out that many of the things which are contributing to these problems are also the same things many of us value. A greater sense of irritation is the price we pay for the convenience of the Internet and mobile phones. “Mobile phones are a very signiﬁcant example to consider. There is no doubt that they are useful in a multitude of ways, and most people do not want to go back to the days before them. But at the same time, mobile phones have almost completely destroyed a sense of quiet public space. There was a time when you could rely on public transport being relatively quiet, a place to think about the events of the day on the way home. Now a bus or a train carriage can feel like being locked in a busy oﬃce.”

The increase in sensory demands is not just due to the use of mobile phones. Advertisers are reaching out to potential consumers more aggressively than ever. News services are now broadcast on buses and at train platforms. Family meals are frequently interrupted by telephone canvassers and email users are often forced to deal with an avalanche of unsolicited promotional messages, or “SPAM”. One could easily imagine that our children and their children may have to guard their homes from an overwhelming amount of annoyance

While it is difficult to deny the growth in these increasingly annoying events in our day, is there actually any real significance to these facts? Penman argues: “There is no doubt that on the surface, this increase of stimuli in our day simply appears to be a matter of minor annoyance. But when we look closely, we can see that this has the potential to significantly affect our psychological health.” He goes on to explain that if exposure to these irritations is frequent and prolonged, very subtly our stress levels begin to rise. As they do, we find there is a compound effect. Stress from the minor episodes in the day starts to increase our feeling of pressure when faced with major challenges at work. We are increasingly carrying a greater and greater stress load, with opportunities to relax and unwind more and more restricted. Penman points out that even though we all sometimes crave stimulation, we have become so obsessed with it in the twenty-first century that it has now become almost impossible to avoid. Shops increasingly feel the need to play loud, thumping rock or techno music. Advertising becomes more and more energetically aggressive all the time. This, Penman maintains, prevents us from dealing with our daily stress and eliminating it from our systems. He adds: “You really do need to get right out of the city and into a quiet space now, though most of us are too busy to do that very often.”

It might be easy for critics to dismiss the annoying experience of too many mobile phones on the bus, or any of the other stimuli Maurice Penman cites. However, it is the failure to eliminate stress which leads to potentially fatal consequences. If these daily distractions are contributing seriously to our stress levels, then Penman has identiﬁed a signiﬁcant danger. We now know that stress truly is a killer, and has been implicated in the rise of depression, heart disease and even weight problems, as it increases hormones in the body which stimulate the appetite for fattening carbohydrate-rich foods.

There is no denying that Maurice Penn’s main arguments are compelling. It seems that stress has become so prevalent that people are getting stressed about their levels of stress. But what are we supposed to do? He suggests we do everything we can to go within ourselves and try to maintain a sense of personal peace and © Copyright Macquarie University 2005

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space. He recommends the use of meditation and relaxation tapes, exercise at the end of the day whenever possible and greater emphasis on fun. Unfortunately, Maurice Penman had no suggestions for those of us who find meditation frustrating, or who get annoyed at relaxation tapes. He had no recommendations for days when you can’t find any equipment you need in the gym, or find yourself irritated at those around you who keep saying you need to have more fun.

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Questions 14-20 The reading passage has eight paragraphs A-H. Which paragraph contains the following information? Write the correct letter A-H in boxes 14-20 on your Answer Sheet. NB You may use any letter more than once. 14 an example of how a place has changed due to modern conveniences 15 physical effects of stress 16 a recommendation of how to deal with modern-day pressures and over-stimulation 17 an explanation of sensory overload and today’s irritations that cause stress 18 an assertion about people’s level of stress 19 a reason why small amounts of stress can feel greater Final Practice Reading test

20 a prediction about growing irritations and interruptions to our personal space

Questions 21-24 Complete the summary below using words from the passage. Write NO MORE THAN FOUR WORDS for each answer. Write the correct answers in boxes 21-24 on your Answer Sheet. People in today’s world are faced with much more 21............................................ stimulation than they used to be. On a daily basis, our modern conveniences represent small but signiﬁcant 22............................................... , which contribute to increasing levels of stress. Psychologist Maurice Penman suggests that because people 23.................................................. from time to time, we are now in a world where we can’t escape it. However, we must escape it and relax or there could possibly be 24........................................................

Questions 25-27 Answer the questions below using words from the passage. Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each answer. Write the correct answers in boxes 25-27 on your Answer Sheet. 25 What word is used to describe how advertising has become? 26 What does stress make you want to eat? 27 What does Penman believe people should place more importance on in order to relieve stress?

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READING PASSAGE 3 You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-40 which are based on Reading Passage 3. A Since its earliest days, television (TV) has been the perfect example of passive entertainment. Now some are trying to change that. Media and entertainment companies plan new interactive services designed to make television a centre of games, information and family activity. Many of these services are enhancements of regular programming – like displaying several football games at once. Some are new ways of doing old things, like video on demand (VOD), which allows viewers to choose from a selection of movies available through their TV at any time. Perhaps one of the most intriguing is personal video recording, which lets them pause and fast-forward TV programs.

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B This is not the first time that the television industry has attempted to persuade viewers to become more active. In the 1970s, a project to provide movies to order was shelved because of the high cost of bringing two-way networks into people’s homes. In 1990 some providers offered text enhancement, giving viewers the option of seeing news, weather and stock prices run across their screen on top of regular programs. This project was also dropped. But circumstances may be more favourable today. The television industry has some advantages which did not exist when previous experiments were undertaken. First, cable and satellite television now reach a large number of homes. Second, the Internet has made most people in the developed world familiar with the process of pointing and clicking. In a sense, interactive television is a way of bringing television a little closer to the Internet. C The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC – a public television channel) has probably been the most experimental network in this field. Its first really successful attempt was made during the Wimbledon tennis tournament in June 2001. Rather than deciding which tennis match to televise at any one time, the BBC allowed viewers to watch up to five at once on a split screen or they could choose to watch one or more of the matches at the same time. This attracted more than five million viewers. Since then, the BBC has produced a steady stream of new interactive programming. D ‘We’re taking factual drama and creating a quiz show around the main programming,’ says Ashley Highfield, ‘That’s totally new and exciting for us. ...... I would love to get involved in interactive dramas, maybe allowing the viewer to switch from one character’s point of view’ (to that of another). But sport continues to be the BBC’s biggest drawcard. ‘What we’re working on for the future is to have football matches with the option of hearing the partisan commentary from local radio stations,’ says Highfield. Commercial television companies, which have to keep an eye on profit, have been less daring. However, according to Josh Bernoff, an analyst at Forrester Research, a lack of copyright may delay growth over the next five years. That is why the first companies to offer VOD have been cable channels that own their own content. E The biggest barrier to VOD and other interactive services is technophobia – fear of technology. In test markets, viewers often don’t know they have the service, or are reluctant to use it. One solution is to give the TV screen the look of a Web page, with toolbars and display menus. Since younger consumers tend to be early adopters of new technology, videogames may take off quickly. In recent months, the three biggest manufacturers of TV games have introduced online components. In two years, experts say, most gamers may go online via TV. F Television’s best minds are convinced that interactive TV will eventually succeed. But if this happens, what will be the effect on the status quo? Will greater viewer control overthrow the whole business model of TV, which is based on selling advertising to a largely captive audience. Network executives face a dilemma. The more control they give viewers, the more they threaten the practice of selling prime-time advertising. G Rick Mandler, a Disney vice-president of enhanced TV feels that interactive TV companies will press for a redesign of personal recording services so that they are ‘advertising friendly’. Tracey Swedlow, editor of the newsletter Interactive TV Today, believes that ‘advertising is going to have to adapt.’ How much will the rest

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of us have to adapt? ‘It’s going to be a gradual process, not a revolution,’ says Maggie Wilderotter, an interactive TV executive in California. ‘People watch TV to be entertained. It’s not work.’ She feels that viewers do not want to do too much themselves. Swedlow, on the other hand, thinks the changes will be more fundamental. ‘TV will feel more like a tool you can use.... It’ll be something you can manage rather than just take in.’ adapted with permission from Gutrel, Fred, ‘The Future of TV’, Newsweek ‘Issues 2003’ Special Edition, Dec 2002 – Feb 2003.

Questions 28-32 Look at the following opinions (Questions 28-32) and the list of people below. Match each opinion with the person credited with it. Write the correct letter A-E in boxes 28-32 on your Answer Sheet. 28 TV viewers may be unwilling to exert themselves. 29 TV companies will urge the adaptation of programming to suit advertisers. Final Practice Reading test

30 Legal complications may slow TV innovation. 31 Advertisers, rather than viewers or broadcasters, will need to change. 32 New elements may be added to existing program types. A

Ashley Highﬁeld

Josh Bernoff

Rick Mandler

Maggie Wildrotter

Tracey Swedlow

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Questions 33-39 Reading Passage 1 has seven paragraphs labeled A-G. Which paragraph contains the following information? Write the correct letter A-G in boxes 33-39 on your Answer Sheet. NB You may use any letter more than once. 33 examples of unsuccessful experiments in interactive TV 34 a description of how interactive TV may threaten its revenue base 35 a prediction of who will most readily adopt interactive TV 36 an explanation of why interactive TV is easier for cable channels to offer 37 a prediction of the speed at which interactive TV will grow 38 a description of the ďŹ rst successful interactive TV services Final Practice Reading test

39 reasons why interactive TV may be more successful now than in the past

Questions 40 Choose the correct letter A, B or C. Write your answer in box 40 on your Answer Sheet. 40 Which of the following is the most suitable title for Reading Passage 3? A B C

Video on Demand Persuading Viewers to be More Interactive Is TV Ready for a New Era?

Reading Passages P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 P6 P7 P8 P9 P10 P11

Cats Clocking Cultures Culture and Learning Endangered Languages Health Effects of Systemic Poisons Esperanto Migrant Labour Principles of Management in the Computer Age The Rush Treating a Disease or Inventing One? The Use of Comics in Education

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P1 - Cats A

The campaign against cats has become so exaggerated it has lost its focus. Much energy that could be put to good use is being wasted on futile campaigns that do little more than aggravate cat owners.

It is widely believed that because cats prey on native birds they could bring about their extermination. But predation seldom leads to extinction in such a simplistic way. If it did there would be no animals left in Africa, as those big cats called Lions would have eaten them all up.

Enormous numbers of birds are killed by pets in gardens, it is true. But while this may sound alarming, ecologically there is nothing wrong with it- predation is a fact of life. Birds are killed in forests too, by a whole gamut of predators including snakes, goannas, falcons, butcherbirds, quolls, dingoes and even spiders. Pet cats are the urban counterparts to a large range of native predators.

Hunting by pet cats would only be a problem if the rate of predation, combined with other deaths, exceed the breeding rate of the birds. This does not seem to be the case. Several studies show the urban environments actually support a higher density of birds than native forests, despite all the cats. This is partly because of all the garden plants with berries and nectar rich ﬂowers.

The native garden birds killed by cats are nearly all widespread adaptable species that are thriving in response to urbanisation. Some of them are probably more abundant now than they were before European settlement. This deﬁnitely seems to be the case for the common garden skinks that cats often kill.

Feral cats are a much greater threat to wildlife than pet cats, and in some situations they are a major hazard. But not usually to birds, which they seldom eat. Studies of their diet conﬁrm what cartoonists have always known: that cats prefer rats, mice and other small mammals. In a major article on cats (Nature Australia, Winter 1993) Chris Dickman stated: ‘In most Australian studies, rabbits constitute the single most important prey.’

To be useful, the anti-cat campaign should focus on speciﬁc situations where cats are a proven problem, and where something can actually be done about it. But to make the sweeping claim that ‘Cats threaten the future survival of most wildlife,’ as the Victorian Department of Education does in a leaﬂet, is to exaggerate the case.

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P2 - Clocking Cultures If you show up an hour late in Brazil, no one notices. But if you keep someone in New York City waiting for five or 10 minutes, you have some explaining to do. Time is elastic in many cultures but is tighter and more fixed in others. Indeed, the way members of a culture perceive and use time reflects their society’s priorities and even their own worldview.

Social scientists have recorded wide differences in the pace of life in various countries and in how societies view time – whether as an arrow piercing the future or as a revolving wheel in which past, present and future cycle endlessly. Some cultures combine time and space: the Australian Aborigines’ concept of the “Dreamtime” encompasses not only a creation myth but a method of finding their way around the countryside. Interestingly, however, some views of time – such as the idea that it is acceptable for a more powerful person to keep someone of lower status waiting – cut across cultural differences and seem to be found universally. s

The study of time and society can be divided into the pragmatic and the cosmological. On the practical side, in the 1950’s anthropologist Edward T. Hall, Jr., wrote that the rules of social time constitute a “silent language” for a given culture. The rules might not always be made explicit, he stated, but “they exist in the air… They are either familiar and comfortable or unfamiliar and wrong.” In 1955 he described … how differing perceptions of time can lead to misunderstandings between people from separate cultures. “An ambassador who has been kept waiting for more than half an hour by a foreign visitor needs to understand that if his visitor “just mutters an apology” this is not necessarily an insult.” Hall wrote. “The time system in the foreign country may be composed of different basic units, so that the visitor is not as late as he may appear to us. You must know the time system of the country to know at what point apologies are really due… Different cultures simply place different values on the time units.”

Most cultures around the world now have watches and calendars, uniting the majority of the globe in the same general rhythm of time. But that doesn’t mean we all march to the same beat. “One of the beauties of studying time is that it’s a wonderful window on culture,” says Robert V. Levine, a social psychologist at California States University at Fresno. “You get answers on what cultures value and believe in. You get a really good idea of what’s important to people.”

Levine and his colleagues have conducted so-called pace-of-life studies in 31 countries. In A Geography of Time, published in 1997, Levine describes how he ranked the countries by using three measures: walking speed on urban sidewalks, how quickly postal clerks could fulfill a request for a common stamp, and the accuracy of public clocks. Based on these variables, he concluded that the five fastest-paced countries are Switzerland, Ireland, Germany, Japan, and Italy; the five slowest are Syria, El Salvador, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico

Kevin K. Birth, an anthropologist at Queens College, has examined time perception in Trinidad. Birth’s 1999 book, Any Time Is Trinidad Time: Social Meanings and Temporal Consciousness, refers to a commonly used phrase to excuse lateness. In that country, Birth observes, “if you have a meeting at 6:00 at night, people show up at 6:45 or 7:00 and say, A ‘ ny time is Trinidad time.’” When it comes to business, however, that loose approach to timeliness works only for the people with power. A boss can show up late and toss oﬀ “any time is Trinidad time,” but the underlings are expected to be more punctual. For them, the saying goes, “time is time.” Birth adds that the tie between power and waiting time is true for many other cultures as well.

Birth attempted to ﬁnd out how Trinidadians value time by exploring how closely their society links time and money. He surveyed rural residents and found that farmers – whose days are dictated by natural events, such as sunrise – did not recognize the phrases, “time is money,” “budget your time,” or “time management,” even though they had satellite TV and were familiar with Western popular culture. But tailors in the same areas were aware of such notions. Birth concluded that wage work altered the tailors’ view of time. “The ideas of associating time with money are not found globally,” he says, “but are attached to your job and the people you work with.”

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Some cultures do not draw neat distinctions between the past, present and future… Ziauddin Sardar, a British Muslim author and critic, has written about time and Islamic cultures. Muslims “always carry the past with them,” says Sardar, who editor of the journal Futures and visiting professor of postcolonial studies at City University, London. “In Islam, time is a tapestry incorporating the past, present and future. The past is ever present.” … Sadar asserts that the West has “colonized” time by spreading the expectation that life should become better as time passes: “If you colonize time, you also colonize the future. If you think of time as an arrow, of course you think of the future as progress, going in on direction. But diﬀerent people may desire diﬀerent futures.” adapted with permission from Gutrel, Fred, ‘The Future of TV’, Newsweek ‘Issues 2003’ Special Edition, Dec 2002 – Feb 2003.

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P3 - Culture and Learning Every culture has its own distinctive conventions regarding what should be learned and how learning should take place. In one culture, students may be encouraged to work with their classmates, while in another culture this activity may be prohibited. In some societies, students are discouraged from asking questions, while in others they may be required to do so.

Diversity exists not only between cultures, but also within a single culture. Most British primary and secondary schools, for example, the teacher is the primary provider of required information and rote learning plays an important role in the acquisition of this information. However, when these students proceed to university, they face a new set of academic norms and expectations. Although memorisation is still required, much more emphasis is placed on the critical evaluation of learning and independent research.

The analysis of writing by students from different cultures suggests that the thinking and writing process is a culture-specific phenomenon. The ability to write well in one language does not necessarily guarantee an equivalent competence in another language, irrespective of an individual’s grammatical proficiency in that language. Although most researchers would argue that writing and thinking are culture-specific phenomena, considerable controversy has been aroused by attempts to provide cognitive profiles for specific cultures. An American study which analysed the way in which students from different cultural backgrounds structured a paragraph of factual writing argued that at least five cognitive profiles could be distinguished.

It may be argued that a similar diversity of cognitive and rhetorical style also exists between academic disciplines. Although standard models for writing reports exist in both Chemistry and physics, an adequate physics report may not satisfy the requirements of the chemistry ‘sub-culture’. The departments of tertiary institutions generally publish study guides which provide detailed writing guidelines. These list the rhetorical, referencing and formatting conventions required by each discipline. Before submitting any written work, students are advised to consult appropriate guides and ensure that their written assignments conform to expectations.

There are, in short, three levels of cultural adjustment which face the overseas undergraduate student: adjustment to a diﬀerent culturally based learning style; adjustments associated with the move from secondary to tertiary education; and the adjustments related to entry into a speciﬁc disciplinary sub-culture.

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P4 - Endangered Languages A

Ten years ago Michael Krauss sent a shudder through the discipline of linguistics with his prediction that half of the 6,000 or so languages spoken in the world would cease to be uttered within a century. This prediction was based upon the fact that many of the world’s languages were rapidly falling from use. In essence, younger generations are not being taught how to speak their local language or dialect and many indigenous communities have resorted to speaking the dominant language. Krauss maintained that unless scientists and community leaders directed a worldwide eﬀort to stabilize the decline and conserve these endangered local languages, nine-tenths of the linguistic diversity of humankind would probably be doomed to extinction.

Krauss’s prediction was little more than an educated guess, but other respected linguists had been expressing similar alarm. Kennith L. Hale of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has stated that eight languages on which he has done ﬁeldwork have since passed into extinction. A 1990 survey in Australia found that 70 of the 90 surviving Aboriginal languages were no longer used regularly by all age groups. The same was true for all but 20 of the 175 Native American languages spoken in the U.S.

On the face of it, the consolidation of human language might seem like a good trend, one that could ease ethnic tensions and aid global commerce. Linguists don’t deny those beneﬁts, and they acknowledge that in most cases small communities choose (often unconsciously) to switch to the majority language because they believe it will boost their social or economic status.

Many experts in the field nonetheless mourn the loss of rare languages, for several reasons. To start, there is scientific self-interest: some of the most basic questions in linguistics have to do with the limits of human speech, which are far from fully explored. Many researchers would like to know which structural elements of grammar and vocabulary – if any – are truly universal and probably therefore hardwired into the human brain. Other scientists try to reconstruct ancient migration patterns by comparing borrowed words that appear in otherwise unrelated languages. In each of these cases, the wider portfolio of languages you study, the more likely you are to get the right answers. “I think the value is mostly in human terms,” says James A. Matisoff, a specialist in rare Asian languages at the University of California at Berkeley. “Language is the most important element in the culture of a community. When it dies, you lose the special knowledge of that culture and a unique window on the world.”

However, it is not all bad news. Just because a speech community is small does not mean it is doomed. At last report, Akira Yamamoto of the University of Kansas in the United States, there were just 185 people who spoke Karitiana. But they all lived in the same village in Brazil, which had just 191 inhabitants. So more than 96 percent of the population was still speaking the language and teaching it to their children. Because surveys of endangered languages tend to look only at the number of speakers, “there has been a history of linguists predicting the death of languages only to return 20 years laer to ﬁnd them still there,” says Patrick McConvell of the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies in Canberra.

One factor that always seems to occur in the demise of a language, according to theorist Hans-Jurgen Sasse of the University of Cologne in Germany, is that the speakers begin to have “collective doubts about the usefulness of language loyalty.” Once they start regarding their own language as inferior to the majority language, people stop using it for all situations. Kids pick up on the attitude and prefer the dominant language. “In many cases, people don’t notice until they suddenly realize that their kids never speak the language, even at home,” says Douglas H. Whalen of Yale University in the United States. This is how Cornish and some dialects of Scottish Gaelic slipped into extinction. And it is why Irish Gaelic is still only rarely used for daily home life in Ireland, 80 years after the republic was founded with Irish as its ﬁrst oﬃcial language.

“Ultimately, the answer to the problem of language extinction is multilingualism,” Matisoﬀ argues, and many linguists agree. “Even uneducated people in the world speak more than one tongue, and in places such as Cameroon (279 languages), Papua New Guinea (823) and India (387) it is common to speak three or four distinct languages and a dialect or two as well.

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“Many Americans, and Canadians to the west of Quebec, have a gut reaction that anyone speaking another language in front of them is committing an immoral act,” Grimes observes. “You get the same reaction in Australia and Russia. It is no coincidence that these are the areas where languages are disappearing the fastest.” The ﬁrst step in saving dying languages is to persuade the world’s majorities to allow the minorities among them to speak with their own voices. adapted with permission from Gibbs, W.W., ‘Endangered Languages’, Scientiﬁc American, July 2002.

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P5 - Esperanto A

Esperanto is an artificial language designed to serve internationally as an auxiliary means of communication among speakers of different languages. Esperanto, the invention of Ludwig Zamenhof, a Polish-Jewish ophthalmologist, was first presented in 1887. An international movement to promote its use has continued to flourish and has members in more than 80 countries.

Esperanto is used internationally across language boundaries by about one million people, particularly in specialised ﬁelds. It is used in personal contacts, on radio broadcasts, and in a number of publications as well as in translations of both modern works and classics. Its popularity has spread from Europe – both East and West – to parts of Asia including Japan. Despite having no impact on the neighbouring countries of Korea and Vietnam, Esperanto has had its greatest impact in China, where it is taught in universities and used in many translations (often in scientiﬁc or technological works). El Popola Cinio, a monthly magazine in Esperanto from the People’s Republic of China, is read worldwide. Radio Beijing’s Esperanto program is the most popular program in Esperanto in the world.

Esperanto’s vocabulary is drawn primarily from Latin, the Romance languages, English and German. Spelling is completely regular. A simple and consistent set of endings indicates grammatical functions of words. Thus, for example, every noun ends in –o, every adjective in –a, and the inﬁnitive of every verb in –i.

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P6 - Health Effects of Systemic Poisons The intestinal section located between the upper-bowel tract and the stomach is lined with many ﬁngerlike projections of mucous membrane, known as ‘villi’. The villi are surrounded by capillary blood vessels, whose function is to absorb the products of digestion. Soluble poisons are rapidly absorbed by the villi into the bloodstream. In the case of lead poisoning, this results in a wide variety of eﬀects on the blood-forming mechanism, the gastrointestinal tract and the central nervous system.

The passage of non-soluble poisons through the digestive system stimulates mucous-producing glands in the stomach and bowel. The production of mucus then induces spastic movements of the stomach which may result in the expulsion of the toxins by vomiting or as fecal matter via the lower intestine. The ingestions of non-soluble toxins is associated with fecal blood, diarrhoea and constipation.

The intestinal section located between the upper-bowel tract and the stomach is lined with many ﬁngerlike projections of mucous membrane, known as ‘villi’. The villi are surrounded by capillary blood vessels, whose function is to absorb the products of digestion. Soluble poisons are rapidly absorbed by the villi into the bloodstream. In the case of lead poisoning, this results in a wide variety of eﬀects on the blood-forming mechanism, the gastrointestinal tract and the central nervous system.

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P7 - Migrant Labour A

Migrant workers, those workers who move repeatedly in search of economic opportunity, typically perform society’s temporary jobs. The migrant’s low paid work includes ‘stooped labour’ like cultivating crops, menial services such as cleaning public restrooms, ‘sweatshop’ work such as making apparel, and assembly line factory work like putting together computer parts. Migrant workers are often pivotal for economic growth.

Until the twentieth century most migrant labour was internal. For example, generations of former slaves from the southern parts of the United States annually followed the crops north. Recently, however, most migrant labour in Europe and America has been external – that is, workers from other countries.

Migrant workers rarely understand the customs and language of their host societies and are frequently ill-housed, malnourished, underpaid, and denied basic legal rights. Their children fall behind in school and are then apt to be put to work in violation of child labour laws. Poor sanitation, unsafe drinking water and overcrowded living conditions make migrant labourers especially susceptible to contagious disease. In the 1980s and 1990s their tuberculosis and hepatitis rates far exceeded national norms. AIDS also spread rapidly. In short, the lives of migrant workers tend to be less comfortable and shorter that those of non-migrants.

International economics determines where external migrants go. In the 1940s, when railroad workers and farmhands went off to fight in World War II, the United States reached an agreement with Mexico to provide millions of temporary Mexican migrants. In the post-war period, ‘guest workers’ from southern Europe, Turkey and North Africa helped rebuild north-western Europe. In the 1970s and 1980s the oil-rich monarchs of Saudi Arabia and Kuwait flew Asians in to build their new cities.

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P8 - Principles of Management in the Computer Age Advances in technology in different periods of history have led to the need to change principles of management. In the agricultural era principles were unable to cope with the arrival of machinery-based technology and new forms of management and work had to be developed. The industrial era that followed used new principles to divide work, reward people and control activities, resulting in steep systems of industrial management and global markets. Today, we find ourselves in the computer age and past industrial era assumptions, principles and values are no longer valid. There is now a need for more effective integration and teamwork within companies and with their suppliers, partners and customers.

The early industrial era experienced many problems in implementing and exploiting newly available technology. The result was steep triangular management systems, where work was broken down into smaller steps and diﬀerent people were assigned to carry out these activities. They were structured according to “boss-employee” relationships. Everyone had a boss who determined what activities were to be carried out and how.

We are now ﬁnding ﬂatter network organisations are beginning to emerge replacing the steep triangular management systems of the industrial era. This networking has two dimensions: (1) the technical infrastructure that links computer systems and people, and (2) the human process, networking with other people, linking knowledge and hopes.

We are fascinated by the wonders of local and wide-area networking technology, including the Internet and World Wide Web. These technologies are allowing us to bring together applications, databases, and people in new ways. Networking technology is essential if we hope to build successful enterprises, but by itself, it is not enough. Human input is the basis of the integration process. It is a continuing process of reaching out to one another to form multiple cross-functional work teams within and between organisations. In a networking environment, people work together on whole sets of challenges in teams and groups of teams across functional and organisational boundaries. Network enterprises build upon “peer-to-peer” relationships. People are expected to take initiatives, based upon their understanding of an agreed plan.

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adapted from Savage, C.M., 1996, Fifth Generation Management, revised ed., Newton, MA: Butterworth Heinemann.

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P9 - The Rush A

Lying, huddled in his sleeping bag, Bernard Peters listens to the howling wind buﬀeting the walls of his tent. In the distance, the occasional sound of falling ice and rock, rumbles into the valley below. After initially falling asleep quite quickly at around 9pm, the sound of the gale tearing through the mountain peaks has kept him awake for the past 2 hours. He glances at his watch. It is now 3 am. Only two more hours of sleep and it will be time to continue his assault on Mount Manaslu, the eighth highest mountain in the world standing at a daunting 8163 metres, just 685 metres lower than nearby Mount Everest.

Bernard is part of an ever-growing group of people addicted to so-called ‘extreme’ sports. These sports, which include activities such as mountain climbing, scuba diving, bungie jumping and sky diving, challenge the individual to push themself to and beyond their physical and psychological limit. The aim of performing such death defying feats is not to further science or for the discovery of anything that could beneﬁt humanity. If asked, participants of such activities will tell you they are there for ‘the rush’. .

This ‘rush’ they refer to is actually the biological phenomenon of the release of adrenaline into the blood. Adrenaline is a chemical produced by the body in the adrenal glands, located above the kidneys. According to Professor Vice of Alablast University, when people ﬁnd themselves in a stressful situation, the glands release adrenaline into the bloodstream, where it provides the body with a sudden surge of energy. This causes the heart rate and body temperature to increase and senses such as sight and smell to become more sensitive whilst reducing pain receptors. Blood is drawn into the body core, so that if the skin is cut open, there will be less bleeding and the muscles of the body tighten ready for use. Professor Vice says that these reactions are the body’s way of preparing the individual to deal with their source of stress.

In daily life adrenaline provides people with the extra energy needed to deal with stressful and potentially dangerous situations. If someone, for example, found themself in a dark street facing a person with a large knife, adrenaline would provide the burst of energy and heightened concentration required for them to deal with the situation and hopefully escape from their potential attacker. The power of this chemical cannot be doubted with doctors using it on patients as a natural treatment for pain and as a sedative, injecting adrenaline directly into patients suﬀering from severe stress disorders and insomnia. There are also various accounts of people performing super human feats, such as leaping over high walls under the inﬂuence of adrenaline.

Psychologist Alfred Ryan, in his recent study on the eﬀects of adrenaline, has shown that many of the people who take part in extreme sports become addicted to the natural high they get from the adrenaline released into their bloodstream. “The result is, they push themselves to perform increasingly risky feats trying overcome their natural fear barriers.” Some actually refer to themselves as ‘adrenaline junkies’, literally living their lives in pursuit of the state of euphoria they get from putting their life on the edge.

Such pursuits, however, do not come cheap. Each event involves a long shopping list of expensive equipment and the costs of transport and accommodation in exotic locations, leaving the more extreme expeditions open only to aﬄuent members of society. Bernard acknowledges that if it wasn’t for his high income as the head of a medical research project at Michou University, he would not be able to pursue his love for the extreme. “I would also love to get married, but right now I just don’t have time to think about a serious relationship. This year I am climbing the Himalayas. Next summer I am oﬀ to South Africa to swim with great white sharks. After that I hope to do some skiing in the Andes.” The list of ‘things to do’ goes on, with all the places and events being as high, new and dangerous as possible.

Bernard admits that his love aﬀair with danger is not to be taken lightly. Just last year, one of his best friends died trying to reach the top of Mount Everest. “I am sad he is gone, but we all have to die some day. I have peace knowing that he passed away climbing a mountain which is what he loved doing.” Sadly his friend will not be the last life claimed in an attempt to reach the top of the highest mound of rock and ice on the planet,

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where an average of seven people die every year. Despite the amount of planning, training and equipment that goes into such expeditions, there are always unpredictable variables, such as sudden changes in weather, equipment failure and injury. Bernard rationalises the risks he takes by stating that all things in life require risks. “Just by trying to cross a road there is the risk you will be hit by a car. Life is short, and I intend to make the most of it”, he says. After almost 2 years of planning, one million dollars to cover costs and intense physical effort, Bernard and his team finally sit on the top of Mount Manaslu. The climax of their journey lasts for a brief 30 minutes before they begin the four day journey back down the mountain, facing further potential danger. Yet, there are no regrets, whatever the outcome. They are willing to risk death for a fleeting glimpse of feeling alive.

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P10 - Treating a Disease or Inventing One? A

Does your child frequently make careless mistakes in school work or other activities? Does he or she often have difficulty organising tasks or activities? Are there times when you are frustrated by the way your child is easily distracted or forgetful? Or perhaps the problem is the way he or she runs about or climbs excessively, is always on the go and seems to find it impossible to play quietly. A dislike of difficult and boring tasks, such as homework, could also be added to this list. If these “symptoms” sound familiar, there is no need to blame yourself or feel bad about your parenting skills. Your child is probably suffering from a medical condition: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD as it is commonly known.

This is the view of Dr Edward Bryant, president of the Australian Foundation for Mental Health and an expert on the condition. Bryant maintains that ADHD affects between 3 to 5 per cent of all children in Australian schools today. In the United States, over 2 million children are thought to suffer from the disorder. According to Dr Bryant, ADHD is the cause of an enormous array of learning problems, as well as juvenile delinquency and anti-social behaviour in the teenage years. Bryant claims “the problem is not only suffered by the children with ADHD. Parents suffer in many ways. Not only do they have to cope with the demands of caring for their ADHD affected children, but they also have to endure criticism that it is their poor parenting skills which caused the condition. We know now that children with ADHD have significantly different brain activity to normal children and thankfully we now have ways of treating the condition. We cannot as yet cure it, but we can help manage the symptoms and offer both parents and children some hope for a normal life.”

The treatment Dr Bryant refers to – or at least the most controversial one – is the use of stimulant drugs such as Ritalin and Dexedrine. Particularly controversial is the fact that these drugs are basically the same amphetamines sold on the street illegally under the name of ‘Speed.’ Bryant concedes that some parents are reluctant to have their children put on these drugs for this very reason. “Many parents express concern that the drugs could prove addictive to their children, but we have proven that this is only the case with adults. Others also worry that the use of these drugs could set up a need for harmful illegal drugs later in life, but this has also been shown to be a myth.”

It is not a myth according to Professor Jane Mitchell, a leading child psychologist at the University of East Sydney. She considers the views of Edward Bryant to be more than simply inaccurate. She maintains that they are positively dangerous. “ADHD is a disorder that has been created by those administering its treatment. Yes, there are children with behavioural problems and anti-social habits. But these are caused by many different factors and have many different solutions. I ask all parents with difficult children this question: Do you want your child being labelled as one who misbehaves, or as one who suffers from clinical mental illness? That is your choice.”

Professor Mitchell refutes Bryant’s so-called proof, arguing that there is no conclusive evidence that children labelled with ADHD have diﬀerent brain function. She also is strongly opposed to the use of stimulant drugs to treat the condition. Contrary to Bryant’s claims, she maintains that there is considerable evidence of addiction in children on Ritalin, and a growing body of data suggesting that childhood prescription of these drugs has led to serious substance abuse problems later in life with drugs such as cocaine. “We even have documented cases of parents trying to have their child classiﬁed as ADHD so they could sell their children’s drugs on the street.”

According to Jane Mitchell, there are no easy answers to many childhood behavioural problems. But instead of settling for a simplistic label and subsequent drug treatment, we need to ask ourselves more questions. Mitchell poses this question: “What precisely is a normal child?” She maintains all the symptoms quoted by experts like Edward Bryant are found in just about all children everywhere. It is true that some children display these characteristics more than others, and some to the extent where their education and family life are negatively aﬀected. But all of the symptoms on the list occur in all children at some time or another.

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She also points out that standards of how “good” children act vary hugely from culture to culture. “Technically, a child who is considered well-behaved in one culture could be classiﬁed as having ADHD in another. In Melanesian societies such as Papua New Guinea, for instance, children would never be expected to sit quietly at the dinner table while adults talked. They would be permitted to run around and basically be children.”

Labeling a wide range of unpleasant behaviours as a psychiatric disorder and then treating it with drugs might not be the answer, but it is a good way of avoiding a lot of very diﬃcult questions. It is also a quick and convenient way for parents and health practitioners alike to attempt to “ﬁx” and dispense of behaviours in children which have emotional and psychological roots which other forms of treatment could equally address.

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Psychiatrists are ticking them oﬀ a list and adding them up to be a medical diagnosis.” Mitchell lists many factors which can contribute to an excessive display of the behaviour which can lead to the label of ADHD: stress from divorce and domestic problems, growing pressure for children to achieve good results in school and excessive stimulus from television and computer games.

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P11 - The Use of Comics in Education A

Comics, or something very like them, have been used for instruction for thousands of years. Sequential or serial art - a series of pictures which tell a story - has a history almost as long as that of mankind itself. Prehistoric cave paintings from areas such as Lascaux in France show simple stories in which a hunter successfully brings down his prey. Before the invention of writing, drawing was the only way in which the story of a hunting success, or any other story, could be recorded. Later generations could learn of the achievements of their ancestors from the paintings, which may have been used as an aid to oral storytelling.

Much later, after the invention of writing, sequential art continued to be used for the instruction of those among the population who were illiterate. Carved or painted friezes (bands of graphic decoration) accompanied written inscriptions in ancient Egyptian temples, so that those who could not read could understand and participate in religious rituals; the interior walls of many medieval cathedrals and churches in Europe were covered with painted squares depicting religious stories - again, so that the illiterate could ‘read’ them. This type of art can be regarded as one of the forerunners of the modern comic book.

Comic strips and books ﬁrst appeared in the 19th century. For a long time, they were regarded as a hindrance to education. It was believed that comics would in some way destroy a child’s ability to concentrate on writing without illustrations. It was also widely believed that comics promoted the use of substandard language and bad spelling, therefore hindering a child’s reading development. These attitudes were probably strengthened by a reaction against the violent element found in some comics, but they extended even to those with the most harmless subject material – animal stories, for example, or even the ‘classic’ comics of the 1960s and 70s, based on stories from Shakespeare or other ‘high culture’ authors. Many educators and parents believed that the latter were especially harmful in that, by providing a shortcut to the classics, they prevented young people from tackling the real thing. Catherine L. Kouns, the Marketing Director of Warp Graphics, a company which produces comics, states that ‘Comics were regarded as one of the lowest forms of life on the scale of literary evolution’. Dr Elaine Millard of the University of Sheﬃeld believes that ‘this view arises from the fact that all comics are created from the interaction of images, which are dominant, with a small amount of text. Critics regard reading comics as “looking at pictures” which they equate with a lack of literacy in children.’

In recent times, some educators have been rethinking former attitudes to comics, and have been exploring them as a possible aid in fighting illiteracy. The Wisconsin Literacy Education and Reading Network advocates the use of comics to teach where other methods have been unsuccessful. They state that comics are a way to motivate children who might not otherwise want to read, as they provide minimal text accompanied by illustrations, humour and references to daily life. The network views them as a valuable aid in helping to build vocabulary, and as a source of information on environmental, political, social and historical topics. Dr Elaine Millard agrees. In a paper entitled ‘Comics and Reading Choices’, written with Jackie Marsh, also of the University of Sheffield, she discusses a project in which comic lending libraries were set up in schools. Teachers whose students participated in the project reported that ‘the children loved it…it was really motivating for them.’ Feedback from children made it clear that the use of comics involved family members who might not otherwise have become involved in the reading process. This was especially the case when the child was male and had been identified as a weak reader. Fathers and older brothers showed active interest in the children’s reading, which encouraged the children to view reading as a worthwhile activity which received male approval.

Some owners of publishing companies which produce comics have been quick to recognize the commercial potential of this new attitude on the part of educators. Gail Burt, owner of Metropolis Comics, states ‘I am deeply committed to literacy and (to) establishing a good foundation for children to become good readers………Comics are no longer just about superheroes; there are literate, interesting stories for all ages and all readers.’

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The use of comic books in education has extended well beyond the area of literacy. For a number of years now, educational projects have been built around them. Professor Jim Kakalios of the University of Minnesota has used comic books such as Superman and Spiderman to teach ﬁrst-year students the fundamentals of physics. ‘Rather than presenting the physics as it’s normally done in a traditional course, we introduce it through problems that present themselves in comic books’, Professor Kakalios states. Other projects have used specially-produced comic books. Following the success of the four-volume set The Japanese Economy for Beginners, the Japanese Government has used similar comic books to explain its White Papers on the Economy; in the Philippines, comics have been extensively used to inform the people on health and the environment, and in other countries such as Thailand, Malaysia and Nepal, governments have distributed comics designed to promote social issues. It seems that comics have come some distance towards regaining the original educational purpose of their distant ancestors.

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