General Training Reading Practice Test 5
SECTION 1 Questions 1-15
Questions 1-6
Read the following notice.
Using NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS OR NUMBERS answer the questions below. Write your answers in boxes 1-6 on your answer sheet.
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ART GALLERY The Art Gallery’s mission is to bring diverse forms of art and craft to the people of this city. New Year festivities: a multimedia exhibition from the four comers of the earth on show in the Hanson Theatre, Level 2, Main Building Free Opens January 1, closes March 20.
The art of the early West: American art of the westward expansion is on show in the South Gallery, Level 3 $15 adults, $5.00 for members, $4.50 for students. Opens March 13, closes June 30
Greek Olympic sculpture: a historical exhibit of work by ancient artists is in the North Gallery $10 adults, $8.00 for members, $6.00 for students Opens July 1, closes August 7
Developmental art: work by gifted local school children on show in the East Gallery. $2.00. Donations may be left in the box at the exit, and will be gratefully received Opens July 25, closes September 30 Headsets are available for the Greek Olympic Sculpture only A fee of $6.00 per adult, $5 00 for members and $4 50 for students will be charged |
Example:
How much will it cost a student to see the Greek Olympic Sculpture?
Answer: $6.00
- Which exhibition can you visit in late August?
- A student would like a headset for the Greek Olympic Sculpture. How much will it cost?
- Which exhibition shows the work of young people?
- How much must a member pay to see tine exhibition of art from the United States?
- In which location would you find the oldest exhibits?
- Which exhibit could a large group see most cheaply?
Questions 7 – 11
Read the extract below from the service directory of a Motorists’ Association.
Answer the questions by writing the appropriate extension numbers in boxes 7-11 on your answer sheet.
What extension should you call if:
Example: you want to pay your bill by Visa card?
Answer: 344
- you want to find out about a baby’s car seat?
- you feel cheated by a repair shop near your home in Newcastle?
- you have trouble hearing and you need road service?
- you are going on a road trip and want to find out what activities are available?
- you want advice on purchasing a vehicle?
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Call our main number 9292 9222 then call these extensions |
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| MEMBER SERVICES, ROAD SERVICE AND INSURANCE
All insurance enquiries 133
Credit card payments 344 Visa, Mastercard for membership and insurance policies (open 24 hours, 7 days)
Teleclaims 123 For motor vehicle claims (open 24 hours. 7 days)
HELPLINE
Road Service 114 (open 24 hours, 7 days)
HOME SECURITY 553 Alarm systems 554 |
TECHNICAL ADVICE 443 (8 30 am to 5 pm, Monday to Friday, 8.30 am to 11 Saturday) for road tests, car buying, advice and assistance on motoring problems. Local call charge
Child restraint enquiries 632
Recorded road report for major highways 222
VEHICLE INSPECTIONS (7am – 10 pm) 1 300 362 802
FINANCIAL SERVICES (8.30 am to 5 pm. Monday to Friday, 8.30 am to 11 Saturday) Home Loan 701 Life Insurance 976 Personal Loans 978 |
LEGAL ADVICE
(8 30 am to 5 pm, Monday to Friday)
Sydney 191 Newcastle 132 Wollongong 132 Canberra 426
SMASH REPAIRS 900 Repairs guaranteed for life, (7.30 am to 5 pm, Monday to Friday)
Batteries 111 DRIVE TRAVEL 122 Local touring information and attraction tickets SERVICE (HEARING IMPAIRED) Road Service 317 Insurance enquiries 728 |
Questions 12 -15
There are 9 paragraphs in this advice to motorists. Answer the questions below by writing the letter or letters of the appropriate paragraph or paragraphs in boxes 12-15 on your answer sheet.
Advice to motorists
A
Always lock your car and never leave your keys in the car. Sounds obvious, but how often have you left your car unlocked while you paid for fuel at a service station or dashed into a shop? A recently-passed law will ensure that you never forget again – heavy penalties apply.
B
Always lock valuables in the boot. Most car crime is opportunistic, so don’t make it easy. And if something is too valuable to lose, the golden rule is take it with you.
C
Thieves need little incentive. A lot of thefts from cars are carried out by youngsters after nothing more than a few dollars, so don’t leave coin-holders if they can be seen from outside. The cost of repairs often far outweighs the value of what is stolen.
D
At night, always try to park in a brightly-lit area where your vehicle can be seen by passers-by. Poorly-lit streets are the thief’s favourite hunting ground.
E
Never park where you can see broken glass from car windows on the ground. Thieves are creatures of habit and will return to the scene of past successes.
F
Install a car alarm.
G
Where available, use car parks that are well lit and have boom gates. Don’t leave your parking ticket in the car.
H
In high-risk areas leave your glove box and ashtray open to show thieves that there is nothing in the car worth stealing.
I
Don’t buy goods offered for sale if the price seems suspiciously low. Chances are the goods have been stolen.
Example: Which paragraph suggests you add extra equipment to the cat?
Answer: F
- Which TWO paragraphs advise you how to show there is nothing to steal from the car?
- Which TWO paragraphs give advice about good places to park?
- Which paragraph warns about the effects of a new law?
- Which paragraph tells the reader how to protect valuable items?
SECTION 2 Questions 16-28
Questions 16-20
Read the passage below, and answer the questions that follow.
Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS OR NUMBERS from the passage to answer the questions below.
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HOW TO USE THE LANGUAGE RESOURCE CENTRE (LRC) General LRC rules We have a number of simple rules to help you use the LRC. Please cooperate and enjoy your visit with us. • No eating or drinking • No copying of audio cassettes Please work quietly. This is a library and many students are studying for exams. Using the LRC • You can use the LRC either on your own during self-access times or you may use it with your teacher as part of a lesson. • If you use it as a self-access student you must scan your borrower barcode (issued by the library staff) when entering and leaving. The LRC is for use by Language Centre students only. • All bags must be put in the bag-rack. • Always work quietly. Photocopying We have a photocopier available. Please ask the library staff to help you. The cost is 20c for one A4 sheet. Borrowing from the LRC Language Centre students are permitted to borrow materials from the library. Other schools’ students must use the facilities at their own schools. Full-time students: Give your photo-ID card to the librarian and you will get an LRC number. Part-time students: You will need to bring your $50.00 deposit receipt from the cashier. When your course finishes, bring your library card back and your deposit will be refunded in cash. Loans Language students can borrow up to 4 items (of which no more than 2 can be kits) at one time. Kits are bags containing book(s) plus cassette(s). All teacher trainee students may borrow up to 3 items: • IELTS materials 1 week • Listening kits 1 week • Most other books 2 weeks Books marked REF in red are reference books and cannot be taken out of the library. Books marked REF in green may be removed by staff only. Renewals Most items can be renewed once. IELTS materials cannot be renewed. |
Use NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS OR NUMBERS from the passage to answer the questions below. Write your answers in boxes 16-20 on your answer sheet.
- Which students may use the LRC?
- What must full-time students show in order to receive an LRC number?
- How will part-time students’ deposits be refunded?
- What mark shows a book cannot be removed from the library?
- What materials must be returned after one borrowing period?
Questions 21-28
Read the passage below about the Buddy Peer Support Scheme, and answer the questions that follow.
International Business Institute – Buddy Peer Support Scheme
Think back to your first days and weeks in a new country. Were there times when you had questions that you wished you could ask a friend? Or when you wanted to have a chat about how you were feeling?
To help new students, the International Business Institute (IBI) plans to set up a buddy peer support scheme. The scheme will help new students meet current students at IBI who can provide them with some friendly company during their first months in Newcastle and help them with any small problems that they may have. Often, buddies may not be able to solve the problem, but they may know who can help.
What’s in it for you?
We believe that being a buddy will be rewarding in several ways. As a volunteer, it will be personally satisfying to know that you are able to help new students. However, it will also help you to make contacts that may be valuable in your future academic and professional lives. If you are an overseas student, it will give you another opportunity to practise speaking English. Lastly and most importantly, we hope that it will be enjoyable for you to be a buddy!
Responsibilities of buddies
- Telephone and arrange to make contact with the new student.
- Meet the student and show him/her around the campus and the local area. Meet for coffee, perhaps. Answer questions about living in Newcastle and administration procedures at IBI. (We will give you a checklist of things to mention when we send you the new student’s name and telephone number).
- Arrange to meet the new student one morning or afternoon one weekend early in the semester, and take the student to places that you enjoy in Newcastle.
- Be prepared to take phone calls from the new student to answer further questions that he/she may have from time to time. Meet to explain information to the new student in person, if required.
- You will be matched to an individual new student. However, if you have friends who are also buddies, you might prefer to form a support group together. This would mean that you meet the new students as a group rather than one-on-one.
- Being a buddy is voluntary. There is no “requirement” to provide assistance beyond the help outlined above. However, we hope that the buddy and new students will enjoy each other’s company and continue to meet each other.
Please note that if you agree to become a peer support buddy, you will be expected to fulfil your role conscientiously and cheerfully. It will be important to be considerate and reliable so that our student can feel confident of your support.
- When you agree to act as a buddy for a particular term, your commitment covers that term only. For example, if you act as a buddy for Term 2, and would prefer to be free in the following term, there is no obligation to continue as a buddy in Term 3. Of course, we hope that you will want to assist every term.
Questions 21 – 28
Look at the statements below. In boxes 21-28 on your answer sheet write
TRUE if the statement is true
FALSE if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN if the information is not given in the passage
- The main aim of the Buddy Peer Support Scheme is to help new students during exam periods.
- Students will be put in touch with others from their own language group.
- The principal reward for the buddy is making new friends.
- The buddy is responsible for making the first move to meet the new student.
- Buddies need to work one on one with the student in their care.
- Buddies will be paid a small allowance.
- The buddy’s obligations finish at the end of each term.
- Buddies are required to attend two meetings per term.
SECTION 3 Questions 29 – 40
Read the passage below and write the answers to the questions which follow in boxes 29-40 on your answer sheet.
How Babies learn Language
During the first year of a child’s life, parents and carers are concerned with its physical development; during the second year, they watch the baby’s language development very carefully. It is interesting just how easily children learn language. Children who are just three or four years old, who cannot yet tie their shoelaces, are able to speak in full sentences without any specific language training.
The current view of child language development is that it is an instinct – something as natural as eating or sleeping. According to experts in this area, this language instinct is innate – something each of us is born with. But this prevailing view has not always enjoyed widespread acceptance.
In the middle of last century, experts of the time, including a renowned professor at Harvard University in the United States, regarded child language development as the process of learning through mere repetition. Language “habits” developed as young children were rewarded for repeating language correctly and ignored or punished when they used incorrect forms of language. Over time, a child, according to this theory, would learn language much like a dog might learn to behave properly through training.
Yet even though the modern view holds that language is instinctive, experts like Assistant Professor Lise Eliot are convinced that the interaction a child has with its parents and caregivers is crucial to its developments. The language of the parents and caregivers act as models for the developing child. In fact, a baby’s day-to-day experience is so important that the child will learn to speak in a manner very similar to the model speakers it hears.
Given that the models parents provide are so important, it is interesting to consider the role of “baby talk” in the child’s language development. Baby talk is the language produced by an adult speaker who is trying to exaggerate certain aspects of the language to capture the attention of a young baby.
Dr Roberta Golinkoff believes that babies benefit from baby talk. Experiments show that immediately after birth babies respond more to infant-directed talk than they do to adult-directed talk. When using baby talk, people exaggerate their facial expressions, which helps the baby to begin to understand what is being communicated. She also notes that the exaggerated nature and repetition of baby talk helps infants to learn the difference between sounds. Since babies have a great deal of information to process, baby talk helps. Although there is concern that baby talk may persist too long, Dr Golinkoff says that it stops being used as the child gets older, that is, when the child is better able to communicate with the parents.
Professor Jusczyk has made a particular study of babies” ability to recognise sounds, and says they recognise the sound of their own names as early as four and a half months. Babies know the meaning of Mummy and Daddy by about six months, which is earlier than was previously believed. By about nine months, babies begin recognizing frequent patterns in language. A baby will listen longer to the sounds that occur frequently, so it is good to frequently call the infant by its name.
An experiment at Johns Hopkins University in USA, in which researchers went to the homes of 16 nine-month-olds, confirms this view. The researchers arranged their visits for ten days out of a two week period. During each visit the researcher played an audio tape that included the same three stories. The stories included odd words such as “python” or “hornbill”, words that were unlikely to be encountered in the babies’ everyday experience. After a couple of weeks during which nothing was done, the babies were brought to the research lab, where they listened to two recorded lists of words. The first list included words heard in the story. The second included similar words, but not the exact ones that were used in the stories.
Jusczyk found the babies listened longer to the words that had appeared in the stories, which indicated that the babies had extracted individual words from the story. When a control group of 16 nine-month-olds, who had not heard the stories, listened to the two groups of words, they showed no preference for either list.
This does not mean that the babies actually understand the meanings of the words, just the sound patterns. It supports the idea that people are born to speak, and have the capacity to learn language from the day they are born. This ability is enhanced if they are involved in conversation. And, significantly, Dr Eliot reminds parents that babies and toddlers need to feel they are communicating. Clearly, sitting in front of the television is not enough; the baby must be having an interaction with another speaker.
Questions 29-34
Complete the summary below. Choose no more than THREE WORDS AND/OR NUMBERS from the passage and write them in boxes 29-34 on your answer sheet.
The study of (29)___________ in very young children has changed considerably in the last 50 years. It has been established that children can speak independently at age (30)_______________, and that this ability is innate. The child will, in fact, follow the speech patterns and linguistic behaviour of its carers and parents who act as (31) ___________
Babies actually benefit from “baby talk”, in which adults (32) ___________ both sounds and facial expressions. Babies’ ability to (33) ___________ sound patterns rather than words comes earlier than was previously thought. It is very important that babies are included in (34) ___________ .
Questions 35 – 40
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in the passage “How babies learn language”?
In boxes 35-40 on your answer sheet write
YES if the statement agrees with the writer
NO if the statement does not agree with the writer
NOT GIVEN if there is no information about this in the passage
- Children can learn their first language without being taught.
- From the time of their birth, humans seem to have an ability to learn language.
- According to experts in the 1950s and ’60s, language learning is very similar to the training of animals.
- Repetition in language learning is important, according to Dr Eliot.
- Dr Golinkoff is concerned that “baby talk” is spoken too much by some parents.
- The first word a child learns to recognise is usually “Mummy” or “Daddy”.
Answer Key: General Training Reading Practice Test 5
Section 1
- Developmental art
- $4.50
- Developmental art
- $5.00
- North Gallery
- New Year festivities
- 632
- 132
- 317
- 122
- 443
- C; H
- D; G
- A
- B
Section 2
- Language Centre students
- Photo-ID card
- (in) cash
- REF in red
- IELTS (materials)
- FALSE
- FALSE
- NOT GIVEN
- TRUE
- FALSE
- NOT GIVEN
- TRUE
- NOT GIVEN
Section 3
- language development
- 3 or 4; 3 – 4 years
- models
- exaggerate
- recognise
- conversation/ interaction/ communication
- YES
- YES
- YES
- NOT GIVEN
- NO
- NO
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