Choose the word whose underlined part is pronounced differently from the others.
advantage
Choose the word whose underlined part is pronounced differently from the others.
monarchy
macho
chameleon
alchemist
Choose the word whose underlined part is pronounced differently from the others.
contemplate
Choose the option whose primary stress is placed differently from those of the others.
The couple were finally _____ by the landlord after not paying rent for six months.
Warning: anyone caught stealing from these premises will be _____.
Nobody wanted to tell Richard he wasn’t invited, but I drew the short _____ so I had to do it.
The local authorities need to _____ down on illegal parking, in my opinion.
I admit breaking the window, but it wasn’t _____.
The new regulations have _____ up a number of problems for the company.
Jim’s a tough character and certainly won’t let anyone push him _____.
Three American fishermen were rescued today after _____ at sea for nine months.
They are unlikely to find any new evidence because so much time has _____ since the crime.
Think of ONE word which can be used appropriately in three sentences.
It is often said that children learn best by _________.
The new sofa looked quite expensive, but in fact it was made of _______ leather.
Alison could do an almost perfect _______ of their teacher, and she always made everyone laugh.
Answer:
Think of ONE word which can be used appropriately in three sentences.
The instructions say you should ________ the glue to a slightly damp surface.
Jane will need to ________ herself more to her work if she is to get a good degree.
I've read the warning, but I don't know who it can ________ to.
Answer:
Think of ONE word which can be used appropriately in three sentences.
Following the accident, the company has agreed to carry out a thorough ________ of its safety procedures.
The whole policy of allowing members to borrow the club's equipment is now under ________
Sally was thrilled to see a positive _________ of her first novel in the local newspaper.
Answer:
Form the collocations using the verbs and prepositions from the boxes. Complete each sentence using a collocation in the appropriate form.
Each verb and each preposition must be used ONCE only.
|
Verbs |
Prepositions |
|
agree, argue, ask, care, know, learn, talk |
about, about, for, for, of, on, with |
We can a great deal the oceans by studying even a small piece of coral.
Scientists do not the origin of the universe.
I had to elderly parents when they both became ill.
She didn’t her stepbrother’s existence until her mother died.
On the website they your email address.
We’re going to the council about planting some new trees in the park.
The teacher says we’ve got to do the test, so there’s no point in it.
Use the word given in capitals to form a word that fits in the space.
LIFE IN EXTREME CONDITIONS
Until relatively recently, it was thought that extreme heat and cold presented (MOUNT) problems to living organisms and that all life existed in a narrow range of favourable temperatures. However, the discovery of extremophiles has forced a (ASSESS) of that view.
Extremophiles are bacteria that survive, and even thrive, in (SEEM) impossible conditions. (PROBABLE) as it may seem, some exist at temperatures exceeding 80° in geysers and hot springs, while others live in the freezing conditions of the Antarctic (WILD). While most species of large animals are threatened by global warming, even to the point of extinction, that kind of ecological change may actually benefit the extremophiles. These organisms may survive long after the human race.
Choose the correct answer.
WIKIPEDIA
The online encyclopedia Wikipedia challenges our preconceptions about factual information.
Before Wikipedia, it was as read that encyclopedias were written by paid experts. In other words, before Wikipedia, the “reader” of an encyclopedia had no control over the content. Wikipedia has changed all that, as anyone is allowed to edit add content. The idea has certainly on and, for millions of people, Wikipedia a vital need.
Wikipedia’s founders insist that, on the whole, the information on the site is no less accurate than more traditional encyclopedias. Despite this, critics have the site for its inaccuracies. Articles on the site have certainly things which are not in fact true. However, although these have received wide media , they essentially the problem. Most people have little how many inaccuracies there are in traditional printed encyclopedias too.
Fill each of the following blanks with ONE suitable word.
THE LEGEND OF THE ROOT
Ginseng is one of the great mysteries of the east. Often referred to as the 'elixir of life' its widespread use in oriental medicine has led to many myths and legends building up around this remarkable plant. Ginseng has featured an active ingredient in oriental medical literature for over 5,000 years. Its beneficial effects were, at one time, widely recognized and praised that the root was said to be worth its weight in gold. the long history of ginseng, no one fully knows how it works. The active part of the plant is the root. Its full name is Panax Ginseng - the word Panax, like the word panacea, coming from the Greek for 'all healing'. There is growing interest by western scientists the study of ginseng.
It is today believed that this remarkable plant may beneficial effects in the treatment of many diseases which are difficult to treat with synthetic drugs.
Today, ginseng is longer a myth or a legend. Throughout the world, it is becoming widely recognized that this ancient herb holds the answer to relieving the stresses and ailments of modern living. It is widely used for the treatment of various ailments such as arthritis, diabetes, insomnia, hepatitis and anemia. However, the truth behind ginseng works still remains a mystery. Yet its widespread effectiveness shows that the remarkable properties are more than just a legend.
(Đề đề nghị Olympic 30/4 - THPT Chuyên Bảo Lộc - Lâm Đồng)
Read the following passage then choose the best answer to each question below.
IS THERE MORE TO VIDEO GAMES THAN PEOPLE REALIZE?
1. Many people who spend a lot of time playing video games insist that they have helped them in areas like confidence-building, presentation skills and debating. Yet this way of thinking about video games can be found almost nowhere within the mainstream media, which still tend to treat games as an odd mix of the slightly menacing and the alien. This lack of awareness has become increasingly inappropriate, as video games and the culture that surrounds them have become very big business indeed.
2. Recently, the British government released the Byron report into the effects of electronic media on children. Its conclusions set out a clear, rational basis for exploring the regulation of video games. The ensuing debate, however, has descended into the same old squabbling between partisan factions: the preachers of mental and moral decline, and the innovative game designers. In between are the gamers, busily buying and playing while nonsense is talked over their heads.
3. Susan Greenfield, renowned neuroscientist, outlines her concerns in a new book. Every individual's mind is the product of a brain that has been personalized by the sum total of their experiences; with an increasing quantity of our experiences from very early childhood taking place "on screen" rather than in the world, there is potentially a profound shift in the way children's minds work. She suggests that the fast-paced, second-hand experiences created by video games and the Internet may inculcate a worldview that is less empathetic, more risk-taking and less contemplative than what we tend to think of as healthy.
4. Adam Martin, a lead programmer for an online games developer, says: "Computer games teach and people don't even notice they're being taught. But isn't the kind of learning that goes on in games rather narrow?" A large part of the addictiveness of games does come from the fact that as you play you are mastering a set of challenges. But humanity's larger understanding of the world comes primarily through communication and experimentation, through answering the question "What if?" Games excel at teaching this too."
5. Steven Johnson's thesis is not that electronic games constitute a great, popular art, but that the mean level of mass culture has been demanding steadily more intellectual engagement from consumers. Games, the points out, generate satisfaction via the complexity of their virtual worlds, not by their robotic predictability. Testing the nature and limits of the laws of such imaginary worlds has more in common with scientific methods than with a pointless addiction, while the complexity of the problems children encounter within games exceeds that of anything they might find at school.
6. Greenfield argues that there are ways of thinking that playing video games simply cannot teach. She has a point. We should never forget, for instance, the unique ability of books to engage and expand the human imagination, and to give us the means of more fully expressing our situations in the world. Intriguingly, the video games industry is now growing in ways that have more in common with an old-fashioned world of companionable pastimes than with a cyber future of lonely, isolated obsessives. Games in which friends and relations gather round a console to compete at activities are growing in popularity. The agenda is increasingly being set by the concerns of mainstream consumers – what they consider acceptable for their children, what they want to play at parties and across generations.
7. These trends embody a familiar but important truth: games are human products, and lie within our control. This doesn't mean we yet control or understand them fully, but it should remind us that there is nothing inevitable or incomprehensible about them. No matter how deeply it may be felt, instinctive fear is an inappropriate response to technology of any kind.
8. So far, the dire predictions many traditionalists have made about the "death" of old-fashioned narratives and imaginative thought at the hands of video games cannot be upheld. Television and cinema may be suffering, economically, at the hands of interactive media. But literacy standards have failed to decline. Young people still enjoy sport, going out, and listening to music. And most research – including a recent $1.5m study funded by the US government – suggests that even pre-teens are not in the habit of blurring game worlds and real worlds.
9. The sheer pace and scale of the changes we face, however, leave little room for complacency. Richard Battle, a British writer and game researcher, says "Times change: accept it; embrace it." Just as, today, we have no living memories of a time before radio, we will soon live in a world in which no one living experienced growing up without computers. It is for this reason that we must try to examine what we stand to lose and gain before it is too late.
Much media comment ignores the positive impacts that video games can have on many people's lives.
Read the article and choose your answers from the sections A-D. You may choose any of the sections more than once.
Over-consumption
Paul Wachtel asks why economic growth does not automatically lead to an increased sense of well-being
A. In a host of different ways, the economies of the highly industrialised nations of the world have long operated on the assumption that a sense of well-being depends crucially both on the quantity of goods and services available to the population and on the rate at which that quantity is growing. It is easy to understand how such a misconception could hold sway. And yet, there is little indication that people's lives are fuller or happier than those of our parents' or grandparents' generation, who had much 'less'. Why is it that growth has yielded so little in enduring satisfaction? Why do people fall to derive any pleasure from their standard of living when, in fact, they have so much more Than the previous generation? To explicate fully the Ironies and psychological contradictions of the emphasis on economic growth would require considerably more space than is available here, but to begin with, it must be noted that the entire dynamic of the growth-oriented economies that exist in industrialised countries absolutely require dissatisfaction. If people begin to be satisfied with what they have, if they cease to organise their lives around having still more, the economy is in danger of grinding to a halt.
B. The tendency to over-consume results, in part, from advertising, the very purpose of modern advertising is to generate desires; if an ad can make you feel your life is not complete without product X, it has done its job. But ads are not the only source of this phenomenon. Society as a whole is structured to lead people to define their aspirations in terms of products, and new products are constantly being brought out. Moreover, this tendency is exacerbated considerably by another set of psychological factors. A variety of studies have demonstrated that judgments about an experience are shaped very largely by a person's level of expectation. In a growth-oriented society, people's expectations are continually being raised, and so their adaptation level - the level against which they compare new experiences - keeps rising. Only what is above the new standard ever gets noticed. Satisfaction becomes like the horizon; it looks a clear and finite distance away and potentially attainable. But as you approach it, it continually recedes, and after much effort, you are no closer than you were when you began.
C. People's expectations being too high is not the only reason for the ambiguous relationship between material goods and a sense of well-being. Many of the ways we gear up for growth actually undermine some of the more fundamental sources of satisfaction and well-being, leaving us feeling more insecure and less satisfied than we were before. A number of major studies into sources of happiness concluded that once some minimal income is attained, the amount of money people have matters little in terms of bringing happiness. In other words, above the poverty level, the relationship between income and happiness is remarkably small. What does matter, these studies indicate, are things like love, friendship, being part of a community, being committed to or part of something larger than oneself. But it is precisely these things that a way of life organised around growth and market transactions impairs. The expectations, assumptions, and arrangements by which people in the industrialized world live, lead them to sacrifice a great deal, both individually and collectively, for the sake of perpetuating the economic system.
D. Nowadays, we work too hard as we strive to be able to afford the larger and larger package that defines a standard way of life and we make our working lives less pleasant as we, societally, forget that the workers from whom we extract greater productivity are ourselves, and as more people feel the insecurity of corporate efforts to become 'lean and mean'. And all too often, people attribute at the hours of work not even to the wish to 'make it', but simply to the fact that they must 'make ends meet'. For most people in the West, there is simply the experience of having to keep up with the treadmill. Yet what figures comparing present purchasing power with those prevailing in the 1950s and 1960s (an earlier time of perceived prosperity) show, is that the definition of 'making ends meet' keeps changing, What not too long ago would have defined an upper-middle-class standard of living now feels to most people as 'just making ends meet'. The dishwasher, television set and so forth that once were signs of luxurious living are now perceived to be necessities. Perhaps this is a sign of progress and certainly there is something salutary about the fact that we no longer regard as luxuries such items as running water. But as the definition of necessity keeps evolving, we need to bear two things in mind; that the sense of well-being does not increase in the same way and that the earth is groaning under the strain.
In which section are the following mentioned?
The impact on people of organisations seeking greater efficiency:
An explanation of why happiness is always out of reach:
The fact that people's attitude towards certain goods have changed overtime:
Data that has revealed a surprising lack of correlation:
A lack of evidence that people today are more content than they used to be:
The ability of the market to meet people's desire to acquire more goods:
Complete the second sentence using the word given so that it has the same meaning to the first.
The author describes his childhood vividly in the book. (account)
=> The author’s book ……... his childhood.
Complete the second sentence using the word given so that it has the same meaning to the first.
This plant often gets attacked by insects. (prone)
=> This plant ………. by insects.
Complete the second sentence using the word given so that it has the same meaning to the first.
Do you have any idea about how Jack made enough money to buy that new sports car? (light)
=> Can you ………. Jack made enough money to buy that new sports car?
Complete the second sentence using the word given so that it has the same meaning to the first.
Kate has finally accepted that their friendship is over. (terms)
=> Kate has finally ………. their friendship is over.
Complete the second sentence using the word given so that it has the same meaning to the first.
I wasn’t expecting you to begin singing when they asked you to speak. (took)
=> It ………. singing when they asked you to speak.
Complete the second sentence so that it has the same meaning to the first.
Janice soon recovered from her cold.
=> It did ……….
Complete the second sentence so that it has the same meaning to the first.
When he won the scholarship, Alan began to realise just how lucky he was.
=> It began to dawn ………...
Complete the second sentence so that it has the same meaning to the first.
Only passengers with Gold Star tickets may use the executive lounge.
=> Use of the executive lounge ……….
Complete the second sentence so that it has the same meaning to the first.
You should not lock this door for any reason when the building is open to the public.
=> Under no …………
Complete the second sentence so that it has the same meaning to the first.
More and more tourists are visiting the ancient towns in the mountains.
=> There has ……….