0 of 27 questions completed
Questions:
You have already completed the quiz before. Hence you can not start it again.
Quiz is loading…
You must sign in or sign up to start the quiz.
You must first complete the following:
0 of 27 questions answered correctly
Your time:
Time has elapsed
You have reached 0 of 0 point(s), (0)
Earned Point(s): 0 of 0, (0)
0 Essay(s) Pending (Possible Point(s): 0)
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 1-8, read the text below and decide which answer (A,B,C or D) best fits each gap.
A new take on high-speed flight has (1), …………… with a jet aircraft smashing all records by reaching seven times the (2), ………….. of sound – fast enough to get from London to Sydney in two hours. The global race to create the world’s first “scramjet” was won by the United States recently, with NASA comparing the moment with the Wright brothers’ achievements of a century ago. The (3), ……….. flight – in which the jet reached 5,000 mph – lasted eleven sec- onds and ended with a splashdown of the X-43A into the Pacific Ocean, never to be seen again.
“To put this into perspective, a little over 100 years ago a couple of guys from Ohio flew for 120ft in the first controlled powered flight. Today we did something similar in the same amount of time.” Lawrence Huebner, NASA’s lead propulsion engineer, said, “but our vehicle under air-breathing power went over 15 miles.” The significance of the (4),………….. is underlined by the margin between the X-43A and the world’s (5), ………….. fastest jet, Lockheed’s Blackbird. That two- man reconnaissance aircraft, painted black to avoid radar detection, served the United States for 25 years until the Cold War (6), ………. in 1990. Its fastest speed was 2,193 mph. The X-43A is unmanned but NASA predicted that the inaugural flight would inspire business, industry and the military to (7), ………….. in its “hypersonic” revolutionary propulsion system.
A scramjet would (8), …………. an aircraft which had already reached supersonic speeds. The US military is considering using the technology to create a warplane that could bomb targets anywhere on the globe in a matter of hours.
For questions 9-16, read the text below and think of the word which best fits each gap.
Use only one word in each gap.
The future at your fingertips
There is a scene in the film Minority Report in which. Tom Cruise stands in front of a vast Perspex-like in
screen housed in the police department’s Pre-Crime Unit. He gazes (9) earnest at the trans-
parent surface, waving his hands across the tablet to swirl great chunks of text and moving images across the screen to
form a storyboard of yet-to-be-committed crimes. With a simple twist of his finger or a flick of his wrist, pictures. Yet it seems the era of true touch-screen technology is already here. Indeed, when Apple boss Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone in San Fransisco a few years ago, he grandly declared: “We’re reinventing the cell phone.” expand and enlarge, words scroll, and whole trains of thought come to tangible fruition (10) there on the board. The year is 2054.
(11) of the main reasons for Jobs’ bold claim was the iPhone’s futuristic user interface – himself
“multi-touch”. As demonstrated on stage by Jobs (12) , multi-touch was created to make the
most of the iPhone’s large screen. Unlike most existing smart phones, the iPhone has only one conventional button – all
the rest of the controls appear on the screen, adapting and morphing around your fingertips as you use the device, almost (13) the giant tablet in Minority Report.
The demonstration iPhone handset certainly looked like re-invention, but multi-touch, while it was new for Apple, is
(14) no means a new technology. The concept has been around for years, waiting for the hardware side of the equation to get small enough, smart enough and cheap enough to make it a reality. While it still remains
something of a novelty now, there’s a good chance that the (15) years will bring many more
computers and consumer gadgets that depend wholly or (16) on multi-touch concepts.
For questions 17-24, read the text below. Use the word given in capitals at the end of some of the lines to form a word that fits in the gap in the same line.
The wheel might seem to be the most simple invention, but it did not occur to every Civilisation to invent one and it surely has to be the greatest invention. Look around – the wheel is everywhere in our satisfyingly
modern world. It’s (17) SATISFY simple, aesthetically perfect and arguably revelation
the most useful thing in the world. What great moment of (18) REVEAL happened
to bring us this gift? It should really have been invented much earlier than it was.
If you consider the (19) END opportunities man had to witness fallen trees rolling remarkably
downhill, man was (20) REMARK
slow at catching on to the potential of roundness and
gravity. The Mayas, the Aztecs and the Incas all achieved great things without the wheel.
They must have just run a lot and were undoubtedly all the healthier for it.
traceable
Sledges, usually pulled by humans, (21) TRACE
to the Stone Age, were quite enough development
for them. The wheel came later in human (22) DEVELOP than most of us think. refinements
Once it did arrive there were many (23) REFINE made to it as man realised that
the possibilities of the wheel were vast and this ((24) AWAREspurred him on to greater things
For questions 25-30, complete the second sentence so that it has a similar meaning to the first sentence, using the word given. Do not change the word given. You must use between three and six words, including the word given.
After what you’ve been through, it’s only right that they help you out. LEAST
The (25) help you after all you’ve been through.
The accident resulted in the serious injury of many of the passengers. LEFT
The accident (26) injured.
John is unlikely to get the job that he applied for. PROSPECT
There (27) the job that he applied for.
Icy road conditions are thought to have caused the accident. BROUGHT
The accident seems to (28) the icy road conditions.
I don’t intend to reply to his rude letter. NO
I have (29) to his rude letter.
Andrew has been thinking about it all day, but he hasn’t made a decision yet. MIND
It’s (30) all day, but he hasn’t made a decision yet.
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(31) The writer believes that
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(32) What does the writer mean by ‘old hands’ in paragraph 3?
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(33) Which of the following is not mentioned as a benefit of computer marking?
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(34) What is stated to be a disadvantage of the current system?
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(35) What is implied about the general perception of multiple-choice testing?
You are going to read a magazine article. For questions 31-36, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which you think fits best according to the text.
Like it or not, technology is already an established part of the exam process and the only argument still to be fought at this year’s e-assessment conference and exhibition, taking place in London this week, is just how much further in that direction we should go.
At one end, little has changed. Students still, by and large, take exams in much the same way as they always have. They walk into a room full of desks with an invigilator on hand to tell them when to start and stop and to make sure no one is texting anyone else, and everyone is ticking the right boxes, or writing out the answer in longhand if required. It’s once the ink has dried that the real change in the system kicks in. Instead of divvying up the scripts between the thou- sands of markers, they are now scanned into a central computer and the markers then access them online.
The benefits are obvious. It’s quicker, cheaper and more efficient. The really dull components, such as multiple choice or simple questions such as ”name four things that contribute to global warming”, can be marked automatically or by less experienced markers, whereas questions requiring a more nuanced, longer answer can be left to the old hands. Your best mark- ers don’t have to be wasted on the straightforward stuff.
Students can also benefit. “Markers can now give much more precise feedback”, says Kathleen Tattersall, who chairs the Institute of Educational Assessors. “We can tell someone almost exactly what he or she needs to do to improve a grade because we can show them what they got right and wrong. This is particularly useful for anyone looking to resit a January exam in the summer, because teachers can tailor individual revision plans for all their students.”
For all its advantages, no one reckons that this assessment model is the finished article. “There are difficulties that need to be ironed out”, says Martin Walker, a former English teacher and a principal exam- iner for one of the main boards. “Because markers are now often only given a few questions from each paper, it’s hard to get an accurate feel of exactly what a stu- dent does and doesn’t know. When you had an entire exam script in front of you, you could build up a pic- ture of the candidate’s range of knowledge, so when
there was room for doubt in an answer you could make a judgement call based on previous responses. It’s much harder to do that now.“
“There are also limits to what you can easily read on screen”, he adds. “In my experience, most examiners end up printing out the long essays and working from a hard copy, which is both time-consuming and slightly self-defeating.” The danger, as Tattersall concedes, is that schools end up teaching only what technology is capable of assessing. “Rather, we have to look at how IT is used in the classroom to improve teaching and learning and base our exams on that model”, she says.
It is certain that we are only halfway through the elec- tronic revolution. In the coming years, more and more exams will be completed – as well as marked – online, and the government and the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority will have to think hard about ways of maintaining standards.
By far the easiest form of online testing to implement is multiple choice. A student can take the test online and it can be automatically marked instantaneously; this system is almost foolproof. The downside is that most people associate multiple choice with dumbing down, on the grounds that anything that can be reduced to a yes or no, right or wrong answer is bound to be over-simplified.
“Not true”, says Stevie Pattison-Dick, head of commu- nications for Edexcel. “Some multiple-choice exams may be quite straightforward, but if they are, they only reflect the level of knowledge a student is expected to attain. There’s nothing inherently simple about multiple choice. We’ve become very sophisticat- ed in our question setting and are able to cross-refer- ence the answers, so an examiner can now tell whether someone just got lucky by ticking the right box or actually understood the process on which he or she was being assessed.” One of the final exams a medical student has to pass before qualifying as a doctor is multiple choice, so this method of assess- ment has to be extremely rigorous.
(36) According to Stevie Patterson-Dick, multiple-choice exams
You are going to read four reviews of a rock concert. For questions 37-40, choose from reviews A-D. The reviews may be chosen more than once.
37. uses the food vendors at the O2 arena, like reviewer A, to illustrate a point about the band’s attitude towards money?
You are going to read four reviews of a rock concert. For questions 37-40, choose from reviews A-D. The reviews may be chosen more than once.
38. conveys the idea that people may over-analyse the music of Radiohead?
You are going to read four reviews of a rock concert. For questions 37-40, choose from reviews A-D. The reviews may be chosen more than once.
39. disagrees with the other three reviewers, in believing that Radiohead have had their day?
You are going to read four reviews of a rock concert. For questions 37-40, choose from reviews A-D. The reviews may be chosen more than once.
40. like reviewer A, suggests that Radiohead avoid being a mainstream pop band?
You are going to read an article about robotics. Choose from the paragraphs A-G the one which fits each gap (41-46). There is one extra paragraph which you do not need to use.
A. Her father was a mechanical engineer, so it was in the family. As a child she immersed herself in science fiction: “I never really identified with the heroes” she says. “I always thought the scientists who built things for these guys were far more interesting.” She earned her Master’s degree in computer science at Georgia Tech., won a fellowship and worked for a professor with expertise in artificial intelligence and within two months, she was on her way to her Ph.D.
B. At first, the USF contingent had trouble getting through the police lines. “The fire and rescue teams were a bit suspicious, because when they think of robots, they think of big explosive ordnance devices,” she says. But eventually they were able to get close enough to help, and the smaller robots proved remarkably effective. Murphy has moved at an intense pace ever since, working to become even more effective in the event of another terrorist attack.
C. Applause fills the breezy morning air. Some 50 scientists are impressed by the brief demonstration of the VGTV, Variable Geometry Tracked Vehicle. They have come from universities, industry, the military and countries as far away as Japan, Sweden, Italy and England. They have left their classrooms, computers and academic theory behind to get their hands a little dirty: to see an array of search-and-rescue robots per- form in simulated conditions. And they are all here because of Professor Robin Murphy.
D. Murphy and her students don’t actually build the robots. What they do, in essence, is take models made by companies and create the software programmes to adapt them to search and rescue. The little VGTV that performed so effectively in the rubble of the twin towers collapse had been built to explore air-conditioning ducts. They gave it a new brain and figured out ways to transport it in a backpack and deploy it at a moment’s notice.
E. However, there are still many problems with the whole project. Funding is the main one. Murphy often struggles to gain funding from the usual channels due to her lack of an academic back- ground which tends to put off a lot of potential sponsors. They seem to ignore the fact that her achievements have more than made up for any official qualifications that she may be missing. It remains to be seen if this will, in the end, be the cause of the demise of her work.
F. The workshop is full of innovations. Nearby, a team from the University of Minnesota displays its robot named Scout – a tiny tube with two wheels and an antenna. One of the inventors picks Scout up and tosses it on the pavement. No problem. It keeps rolling. “People are starting to see what robots can do”, Murphy says. “One thing we’re trying to do is help rescue workers learn what’s possible.”
G. She was featured for her advances with rescue robots, in particular the work she and several graduate students performed at the World Trade Centre. With a cadre of robots packed in the back of her husband’s van, they arrived on September 12 2001 and stayed for eleven days. A handful of the small VGTV robots squeezed deep into the collapse, helped identify five victims, and transmitted many detailed videos and photos. “But”, she says, ”we weren’t in Discover just because we were at the World Trade Centre. It’s what we’ve done since.”
In the war on terror, University of South Florida engineering Professor Robin Murphy finds herself a pioneer on the front line with a new kind of soldier: the search-and-rescue robot. Strewn about are piles of broken concrete blocks and pipes, metal and dirt. Amid the rubble, a small black object looking like some futuristic toy tank rolls into view. It surveys the damage, edges forward, climbs over a mound of debris, then stops. Suddenly, the rubber treads shift from horizontal to vertical, raising the lens into a better vantage point to transmit images. The robot has done its job.
41.
She looks like an emergency worker ready for action: work boots, navy-blue trousers, white hardhat over her short brown hair. One moment, she’s answering questions from scientists. The next, she’s racing to another robot demonstration, always keeping the program moving. In a larger sense, that’s what Murphy does best – she keeps the relatively new field of robotics and rescue moving forward. January’s “Discover” mag- azine honoured Murphy in its “Top 100 Science Stories of 2002” edition.
42.
Murphy, at 46, is in demand these days. When she’s not teach- ing at USF, she’s travelling the country giving presentations, serving as a co-chair on various committees, or coordinating with the Department of Defence. Murphy is hardly the stiff scientist one might expect from a robotologist. She is disarmingly casual in conversation. Yet she is also intense, pushing herself and the people around her. What separates Murphy from her colleagues is that many of them don’t get out into the field. But that’s where she thrives, and where she gets the knowledge to make her robots successful.
43.
“Imagine the scenario where something green is hanging over the city and you don’t know what it is and or where it’s coming from”, she says. “These guys can roll in, and throw a robot off the back of a truck to carry all the gas meters and detectors. Then, the rescuers are able to figure out what safety precau- tions to take. The robots will help the rescuers make the right decisions.”
44.
”Later, her work began to gain attention when she was a professor at the Colorado School of Mines, where she taught before going to USF six years ago. There, her ideas impressed Rita Virginia Rodriguez of the National Science Foundation. Rodriguez began funding Murphy’s work in Colorado, and contin- ues to do so at USF. “Robin is one of the most important people in this movement,” says Rodriguez. “She’s one of the engineers who is very good, very forward-thinking. What we’ve seen today is the first workshop of its kind and it is all her initiative.”
45.
The birth of robot-assisted search and rescue began with one of the nation’s worst disasters: the 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City. One of Murphy’s graduate students, was appalled at the large, clumsy robots that sat unused in a car park. Blitch soon helped create a Defence Department programme to build small, mobile robots for battlefield applications. At the same time, Murphy and her students began focusing on software: how to control robots, how to integrate them with a computer. When 9/11 occurred, Murphy was there immediately. Yet her team was not accepted right away.
46.
The work never ends. Murphy says, “I just want to be of use. Look at what the guys in fire and rescue service have to do. The technology is there to help them, and it’s up to scientists to provide the right technology to fit to the right people at the right time.”
You are going to read some reviews for different novels. For questions 47 – 56, choose from the articles (A-E). The articles may be chosen more than once.
47. It is easily forgotten once it has been read.
48. People join together to fight a common enemy.
49. A bad start but a good ending.
50. Anti-government rebels are used as guinea pigs.
51. A human transmitter.
52. A predictable but enjoyable ending.
53. The story of someone growing up.
54. This book has been written perfectly for its target reader.
55. Someone keeps remembering things in his/her past.
56. Two eras existing at the same time.
A.Gifts – Ursula Le Guin
Gifts is a coming-of-age story, intended, at a guess, as a book for young teenagers, and as such has to be written with scrupulous care. In this respect it is exemplary. Tightly-plotted, there isn’t a word out of place. Quintessential Le Guin, in fact.
This book is set on a world which might be Earth but could just as easily not be, in what is almost a default fantasy land, with a scrape-an-agricultural-living uplands, and towns sufficiently far off that they barely impinge on the main narrative.
The book is not quite a Wizard of Earthsea but it gets very close and as is usual with Le Guin’s work, Gifts, despite its quota of disputes, conflict and death, is a life- affirming experience, well worth reading by adults of all ages.
B. Soul Purpose – Nick Marsh
It shouldn’t happen to a vet. Alan Reece, human wreck, is called out one night in late December to tend to a preg- nant cow, but the calf is born transparent. This is but the first in a global outbreak of transparent births, and Alan finds himself at the centre of the oncoming apocalypse. Actually this book reminds me not a little of that book about exploding sheep from a few years ago. It’s not a very bad book, it’s just not a brilliant book either. The prologue is terrible; the epilogue is surprisingly good; in between it averages out.
This isn’t the first metaphysical comedy adventure book I’ve read this year, so possibly it’s arrived at the right time to take advantage of a trend of some sort. However, “memorable” and “original” are two words I can’t, in all sincerity, use to describe it.
C. The Space Eater – D. Langford
Wormhole travel is possible but only up to a diameter of 1.9cm. Through one such spyhole, the government discov- ers that a distant colony world is developing weaponry based on Anomalous Physics which could endanger whole star systems. Send in the marines! Oh no, wait, they don’t make 1.9cm tall Marines. Enter Ken Jacklin, one of a team of soldiers trained to charge headlong into death and be grown back in regeneration tanks, even when blown to a pulp. Accompanying him is Rossa Corman, a woman who can send messages coded in pain back to Earth by jab- bing herself in the arm.
The premise that someone can be remade – body and mind – from jam hours after their death is a little hard to swallow, but in general it’s very hard to fault this novel. The characters are rounded and engaging, the story is lively and well told with intrigue aplenty, and the science, however out there it may be, is explained in accessible and thought-provoking terms. A very rewarding read.
D. Babylon – Richard Calder
Babylon has a lush feel to it. Calder writes erudite and richly detailed prose which situates the characters first in the Victorian London of Jack the Ripper and later in the crumbling metropolis of a modern Babylon existing in a parallel dimension. The book is strong on atmosphere and there are some marvellously melodramatic set pieces in which major plot shifts are played out. I get the impres- sion that Calder knows his material and wants the reader to be able to visualise his world clearly but this enthusi- asm for detail is also one of the novel’s drawbacks. The pages are cluttered with facts and at one point I began to feel some sympathy with the character who shouts out that she doesn’t know anything.
Whilst the book jacket promises blood and gore and there are intimations of ravishment scattered throughout the first part of the novel, the second and third parts deliver little of either and the melodramatic quality of the set pieces seems increasingly at odds with the cerebral working out of the novel’s conclusion.
E. Against Gravity – Gary Gibson
In 2088, following a terrorist nuclear strike on Los Angeles, America’s political dissidents are rounded up and sent to the Maze, a top secret research facility, to provide experimental hosts for military nanotech. This is a dense- ly packed Science Fiction thriller, and for all the twists and action the pace felt quite sedate to me. I think it might be all the flashbacks – Gallon is the only viewpoint character, and his story is intercut with lengthy scenes of his time in the Maze, which he has escaped from. This material is well depicted, particularly the gruesome failed experiments and the survival-of-the-fittest tests.
Against Gravity is a good futuristic action novel, but the tagline “Live long enough and this could be your future” on the front cover tells me Gibson intends this novel first and foremost as a comment on the world we live in today.
F. The New World Order – B. Jeapes
In Ben Jeapes’ latest novel invaders arrive on Earth to find the locals already at war; with their superior technology, the invaders hammer both sides indiscriminately but end up uniting the humans against them. Except that these invaders not only come armed with machine guns and airships but also with witchcraft, their special wise cadre tapping the Earth’s lay energy. This is a lively and intelligent novel from Ben Jeapes. A section at the end caps the story with historical notes and a revelation that you may guess before, but which you should still find entertaining.
You will hear three different extracts. For questions 1-6, choose the answer (A, B or C) which fits best according to what you hear. There are two questions for each extract.
You will hear two people who are waiting for a friend.
1 The man seems to think that Pam is
A organised.
B inconsiderate.
C neurotic.
2 What does the woman think?
A They should have a coffee while they wait for Pam.
B They should prioritise their tasks for the afternoon.
C They probably won’t have time to go to the cinema.
You will hear two people talking about forensic technology.
3 The woman believes that forensic technology
A has reached its peak.
B has a long way to go before it can be really useful.
C has the potential to produce evidence that we can’t yet find.
4 The man worries that
A a false conviction is still possible.
B many police officers aren’t trained well enough to use DNA as evidence.
C criminals can get access to personal information on police computers.
You will hear two people talking about their son.
5. What worries the man?
A The people that his son talks to on the Internet.
B The amount of time his son spends on the Internet.
C The cost of his phone bills because his son is using the Internet.
6. The woman accuses the man of being
A out of touch with his son.
B mean with his money.
C ignorant of what the Internet is used for.
You will hear a radio report about a new security body scanner. For questions 7-14, complete the sentences.
The body scanner will be able to tell if someone has 7 a weapon on their body
The scanner will be able to 8 private parts of the body.
The technology was first invented to help pilots flying in 9
The scanner will show if someone has a 10
Operators of the machines will be carefully checked to ensure they are not being 11
Air passengers will no longer need to be physically checked by 12
The scanner can see through all 13
The scanner has enabled officials to see 14 that have been hidden in lorries at ports.
You will hear part of a radio interview with a literary critic about Huxley’s novel, Brave New World. For questions 15-20, choose the answer (A, B, C or D), which fits best according to what you hear.
15 Professor Protheroe believes that people enjoy science fiction because
A they want to do all that they can to protect their ancestors.
B they wish they could be immortal.
C they are naturally curious about the future.
D they dream about escaping from their own tedious life.
16 In the 1930s, Huxley
A was trying to launch his career as a writer.
B was known for his observations on social behaviour.
C could not settle happily in any country.
D could not decide what kind of writer he wanted to be.
17 In writing Brave New World, Huxley was
A trying to outdo Wells.
B tackling a dangerous topic.
C stealing Wells’ ideas and pretending
D going against the grain in literary trends.
18 When Huxley went to the United States he
A felt too nervous to stay there.
B found people to be very unfriendly.
C was offended by American art.
D disliked what he saw.
19 To Huxley, America was
A a warning of what might happen.
B violent.
C a place to make his fortune.
D an exciting symbol of the future.
20 Huxley seems to have been
A a man who embraced great change.
B biased against all nations other than
his own.
C something of a puritan.
D arrogant when comparing himself to other writers.
You will hear five short extracts in which people are talking about inventions.
While you listen you must complete both tasks.
21. Speaker 1
22. Speaker 2
23. Speaker 3
24. Speaker 4
25. Speaker 5
A an actor
B a pensioner
C a social worker
D an unemployed person
E an artist
F a postal worker
G a gardener
H a farmer
26. Speaker 1
27. Speaker 2
28. Speaker 3
29. Speaker 4
30. Speaker 5
A Someone was ahead of his time.
B I used to be abit of a vandal.
C This invention breaks down prejudices of social status.
D I’m really tired of my job.
E You can fool yourself that something is true.
F There don’t seem to be any inventors these days.
G I have to read between the lines in my job.
H My conscience is clear despite what people say.