Готовимся к контрольной & Пишем контрольную

Inventions and Discoveries:
A High Tech Life

Preparation
1. READING
Read the text.

We Should All Understand Big Ideas
Can you distinguish molecules from atoms? Genes from genomes? Do you know what makes an experiment statistically significant? If not, do you care? Are you embarrassed by your scientific ignorance – or almost proud of it?
Scientists have been complaining for decades that while they would be ashamed to admit knowing nothing about Jane Austen’s novels, literary colleagues can get away with total ignorance of relativity and quantum theory. People rarely admit to never having read a Shakespeare play but find it acceptable not to know a gene from a chromosome or the meaning of exponential growth.
Beyond the intrinsic intellectual interest, there are myriad practical reasons why as many people as possible should have a basic knowledge of science. An obvious one is that a scientifically savvy population is less likely to fall victim to fraud and superstition, from astrology to quack cures.
The icon of transformation from scientific ignorance to wisdom is the travel writer Bill Bryson. Shame about not knowing a proton from protein prompted him to spend three years researching and learning what he was missing. The result was A Short History of Nearly Everything, the best science book of the 21st Century so far. If you do not have three years to spare, reading Bryson’s book is an excellent short cut.

1. Match words from the text with their equivalents.

1.	significant	a)	the state of lacking knowledge
2.	embarrassed	b)	to have left in excess or surplus
3.	ignorance	c)	important
4.	beyond	d)	intelligence
5.	intrinsic	e)	confused
6.	savvy	f)	deceit
7.	fraud	g)	a charlatan
8.	prompt	h)	inherent
9.	to spare	i)	in addition to
10.	quack	j)	urge

 

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10

 2. True or False?
1. People readily admit their literary ignorance.
2. People find it acceptable not to be embarrassed by their scientific ignorance.
3. There are many practical reasons why people should have a basic knowledge of science.
4. A scientifically ignorant population is more likely to fall victim to fraud and superstition, from astrology to quack cures.

1	2	3	4

Key:
1. 1. c; 2. e; 3. a; 4. i; 5. h; 6. d; 7. f; 8. j; 9. b; 10. g
2.

1	2	3	4
F	T	T	T

Read the text.

Spacecraft – Heal Thyself

A material that could enable spacecraft to “heal” punches and leaks automatically is being tested in simulated space conditions on Earth.
The self-healing spacecraft skin is being developed by Dr. Ian Bond and Dr. Richard Trask – from Department of Aerospace Engineering at Bristol University in the United Kingdom – as part of a European Space Agency project.
The researchers have taken inspiration from human skin that heals a cut by exposing blood to air, causing it to form a protective scab. In humans, the air chemically reacts with blood hardening it.
In the airless environment of space, mechanical “veins” have to be filled with liquid resin and a special hardener that leak out and mix when the fibres are broken. Both must be runny enough to fill the cracks quickly and harden before it evaporates.
The promise of self-healing spacecraft opens the possibility of longer duration missions. The benefits are two-fold. First, doubling the lifetime of a spacecraft in orbit around Earth would roughly halve the cost of the mission. Second, doubling spacecraft lifetimes means that mission planners could contemplate journeys to distant destinations in the solar system that are too risky to attempt at present.

1. Find equivalents in the text that mean:
1. to make possible ________________
2. cure _______________
3. suggestion ______________
4. to leave unprotected ____________
5. a sort of crust formed over a sore in healing _______________
6. to cake __________________

2. True or False? Correct false sentences.
1. A material that could enable spacecraft to “heal” punches and leaks automatically is being tested in orbit around Earth. ______________
2. Human skin has provided inspiration. _______________________
3. When the fibres of a spacecraft are broken liquid resin leaks out and chemically reacts with air. _________________________
4. The promise of self-healing spacecraft opens the possibility of longer duration missions and journeys to distant destinations. _________________

Key:
1. 1. enable; 2. heal; 3. inspiration; 4. expose; 5. scab; 6. harden
2. 1. F; 2. T; 3. F; 4. T
1. A material that could enable spacecraft to “heal” punches and leaks automatically is being tested in simulated space conditions on Earth.
3. When the fibres of a spacecraft are broken liquid resin and a special hardener leak out and mix.

2. LISTENING
Listen to the advice. Answer the questions.

Which is the best search engine?

The answer often depends on your own tastes. A cake is a cake, but the exact ingredients for making a cake may seem perfect to one person and a disaster to another. Like cake, the results you get from a search engine depend on the recipe used.
Each search engine has a formula called an algorithm, that sorts through millions of listings to find the ones relevant to a particular query and to rank them so that the best and most popular are presented to you first.
There are several key search tips:
– try more than one search engine;
– try phrasing your query as a specific question using key words;
– if you draw a blank, try rewording your query with synonyms or specific words in a certain field.

By T. Kuznetsova

1. Why does the speaker compare a search engine with a cake?
_______________________________________
_______________________________________

2. What key search tips do you remember?
_______________________________________
_______________________________________

Key:
1. In both cases results depend on the recipe used.
2.
– try more than one search engine;
– try phrasing your query as a specific question using key words;
if you draw a blank, try rewording your query with synonyms or specific words in a certain field.

3. USE OF ENGLISH
Read these short dialogues and think of the word which best fits each space. Use only one word in each space.

1.
– (1)_____ you know who first split the atom?
– It was Ernest Rutherford, a New Zealand born scientist. In 1919 he reported that he (2)______ managed to split the atom.
– Splitting the atom was very important, (3)_______ it?
– Yes, it paved the way to nuclear power.

2. germ – микроб
– It is difficult to imagine paper cups (4)_____ an invention.
– What do you mean?
– Paper cups (5)______ invented by one young man, Hugh Moore, in 1900. He wanted travelers (6)_____ drink water which would be germ free.

3.
– Could you imagine the paper clip as invention?
– I’ve never thought about it.
– No one is exactly sure who came up with the first paper clip but thank God somebody (7)______.

4.
– Which piece of technology couldn’t you live without?
– (8)_________ I choose the only one?
– Try to choose.
– But I can’t. I couldn’t even imagine my life without a computer, a mobile, the Internet, a washing machine… It (9)________ be the Stone Age.

5.
– Which inventions are extremely useful for you and which are junk?
– I don’t think that any invention could be really useless. Even if it is thought to (10)_________ useless now people (11)_______ find how and where to use it later. As for me, I can’t imagine our life without high-tech things. I can’t sacrifice anything. Especially my mobile. My parents can get in (12)_______ with me anytime.

Key: 1. Do; 2. had; 3. wasn’t; 4. as; 5. were; 6. to; 7. did; 8. Should/Can; 9. would; 10. be; 11. will; 12. touch

TEST

1. READING
1) Five sentences in the text are incomplete. Choose from the list a-f the one which fits each gap (1–5). There is one extra letter in the list which you do not need to use.
a) galaxies are moving away from us at speeds proportional to their distance
b) together again in a Big Crunch
c) the amount of the most common chemical elements
d) the universe has been expanding and cooling down
e) there might be an infinite number of universes
f) known as dark matter and dark energy, is a mystery

Big Bang

For half a century the Big Bang has been the standard cosmological model of our universe. It holds that all matter and energy originated in a “singularity” – a point of infinite density and temperature. Ever since the Big Bang, (1)_______________________. Three main strands of evidence support Big Bang theory. First, (2)_____________________, suggesting expansion from a single point. Second, the universe is pervaded with “cosmic microwave background radiation”, presumed to be a faint afterglow of Big Bang energy. Third, (3)_______________________ that astronomers observe in space correspond closely to the extrapolation of Big Bang theory.
What came before the Big Bang? There is no scientific way to find out but this has not stopped cosmologists, as well as philosophers and theologians, speculating. According to a popular hypothesis,
(4)____________________, each with slightly different laws of physics; a new universe could start from a singularity in an existing one.
And what does the future hold? One possibility is that everything will come (5)_______________________, after countless billions of years.
But at the moment cosmologists believe that it is more likely that our universe will expand for ever into a cold, desolate nothingness.

Big Crunch “большое сжатие” (конечная стадия цикла пульсации Bселенной)

1	2	3	4	5

2) Match words from the text with their equivalents.

1.	pervade	a)	think
2.	presume	b)	uninhabited
3.	faint	c)	divine
4.	afterglow	d)	spread through
5.	correspond	e)	suppose
6.	theologian	f)	secondary flush
7.	speculate	g)	agree, match
8.	desolate	h)	weak

 

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8

Key:
1) 1. d; 2. a; 3. c; 4. e; 5. b
2) 1. d; 2. e; 3. h; 4. f; 5. g; 6. c; 7. a; 8. b

2. LISTENING
You will hear radio news about Google’s latest step into education.
Google, the Internet search company, is entering the UK schools market – launching a website with resources and news for teachers.
This is the internet giant’s latest step into education – as it already has began to offer online programs and e-mail support for universities.
The free online materials show how to adapt Google Maps and Earth for classroom use.
Google says it will support lessons in history, geography and citizenship.
History topics include the slave trade, castles and the British Empire and geography topics include climate change and natural disasters – based on information integrated with Google’s online maps.
And Google’s advertising policy has already been changed this year to ban adverts for essay writing services.
There had been concerns over plagiarism and the online sale of essays written for coursework and dissertations for GCSE, A-level and degrees.

Complete these sentences.
1. Google is launching a website with resources and _____ ______ ______.
2. Google has already begun to offer online programs and e-mail _______ _____ _______.
3. Google says it will support lessons in history, _______ ______ ______.
4. History topics include the ________ ________, _______ and the British Empire.
5. Geography topics include climate change and ______ _______.
6. Google’s ______ ______ has already been changed this year to ban adverts for essay writing services.

Key: 1. news for teachers; 2. support for universities; 3. geography and citizenship; 4. slave trade, castles; 5. natural disasters; 6. advertising policy

3. USE OF ENGLISH
For questions 1–5, read the text below and decide which answer A, B, C or D best fits each space.

Images of the world – a huge challenge

No one knows who (1)_______ maps, or when or even where. The oldest known examples date back over 4000 years, but the idea (2)_______ be far older. These earliest maps are 4300-year-old clay tablets (3)______ various regions of Persia (now Iran). It is not surprising that maps (4)_______ so many to achievement. For it’s almost impossible to look at a map without wondering what is happening in the places upon it. Countless explorers (5)_______ by maps, to test the truth of what they describe and explore the frontiers.
In many cases, (6)_______, explorers were lucky to survive their expeditions. The lack of accurate maps (7)______ led to a murderous mutiny aboard Columbus’ ship in 1492. More recently, there was a near disaster during the Apollo 11 space (8)_______. Astronauts Armstrong and Aldrin came frighteningly close to crashing into a huge crater that lunar cartographers (9)______ somehow failed to chart.
Even now, cartographers are still busy mapping the world. Some jungle covered area of South and Central America and the polar region have (10)__________ to be mapped in full detail. And we still have better maps of other planets than we do of our own. For example, it will be many years before we have an atlas of the Earth as good as the one we have for the Moon. There, every object larger than 60 metres has been located. To produce a world map with that much detail would be a huge challenge even with modern-day technology.

1.	a. have invented	b. has invented
	c. invented	d. had invented
2.	a. must	b. may
	c. can	d. should
3.	a. showing	b. showed
	c. shown	d. were showing
4.	a. inspired	b. have been inspiring
	c. have inspired	d. had inspired
5.	a. have been inspired	b. are inspired
	c. were inspired	d. will be inspired
6.	a. yet	b. still
	c. then	d. however
7.	a. still	b. already
	c. almost	d. yet
8.	a. mission	b. affair
	c. occasion	d. task
9.	a. have	b. had
	c. were	d. had been
10.	a. then	b. however
	c. already	d. yet

 

1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10

Key: 1. c; 2. b; 3. a; 4. c; 5. a; 6. d; 7. c; 8. a; 9. b; 10. d