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please submit 100 words summary

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Range anxiety - the fear factor still exists. Many people will be more hesitant about an electric firetruck because of the fear that it will run out of charge on the way to an emergency. The average person only drives about 20-30 miles a day, but an overwhelming number of consumers still say that a range of over 200 miles is not enough.
Material investment and production - creating sustainable batteries and efficient charging stations to support more electric vehicles.
Adoption rate - people are accustomed to what they know, and even if they're open to a change, people like having choices. There are more options for gasoline combustion vehicles on the market right now than there are for electric vehicles.

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one more )))

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have some fun

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500-year-old paintings from Raphael found – B1 English listening test - Test-English

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Listening comprehension test for intermediate students (CEFR B1). Watch a video about art and history and choose the correct answers.

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get well soon

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you rely on battery , it depends on what you want
when you rely on something you can get anxious
the infrastructure needs to be built
anxiety disappears

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but I like shell for point collection

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https://elt.oup.com/elt/students/insight/dyslexicfriendlytexts/intermediate/a002002_insight_int_sb_dfrt_unit3a.pdf?cc=sk&selLanguage=sk

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hardship , difficulties , problems
short-lived enjoyment , intangible things , things you cannot touch , trust in the people around you , this is important , even a simple smile can work wonders /2000 bars of chocolate ,
healthy diet , 20-30 minutes exercising ,
feeling blue , start exercising , sleep better

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Article navigation:

50 Word Formation Exercises: FCE

B2 First (FCE) Use of English: Part 3

B2 First (FCE) Use of English: Part 3 Example Test

B2 First (FCE) Use of English: Part 3 question type is called word-formation.

For each gap you get one word in capitals which you have to change so the grammar and meaning fit in the sentence. Here you have to show how well you know word families and if you can change words by using prefixes and suffixes

50 Word Formation Exercises: FCE

Would you pass B2 First (FCE)?
Sign up, resolve the tests and see what results you get.

B2 First (FCE) Use of English: Part 3

Strategy:

1. Read the text for general understanding.

2. Decide what type of word you need for each gap (e.g. noun, adjective, etc.).

3. Look at the whole sentence, not just al the line containing the gap.

4. You may need to add a prefix or suffix to some words.

5. Read through the text and check that your words make sense.

6. Check your spelling.

Tips:

You need to read the whole text to get the writer's opinion on the topic. That's because sometimes a negative prefix will be required. There is usually at least one word requiring a negative prefix, so look out for these.

In the exam always write something. You never know, you might be lucky even if you are not sure of the answer!

B2 First (FCE) Use of English: Part 3 Example Test

Use the word in capitals to form a word that fits in the gap.
For each question, write your answer in the gap.

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50 Word Formation Ex. & Test | B2 First (FCE) | engxam.com

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An essay is the first part of the writing and it is obligatory. The question always has a discursive focus. Discursive writing is a style used in academic writing and it requires the high level of language competence.

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tome -heavy book

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Read the text and choose the correct answer. Click on a gap and a choice of words will appear.

The internet has swiftly become an tool for travellers, with the travel sector, established as one of the mainstays of e-commerce. Much like an unfamiliar city, , the Web can be a daunting place to on your own. Even if you have some idea of where you're heading, you can stumble into many blind along the way. All you need to know is how to go online in the first place; if you don't know that, buy our excellent companion , the Rough Guide to the Internet.

The most obvious appeal of using the Net for travel arrangements is that if you know what you want - a flight or ferry from A to B, the cheapest possible rental car, a cut-price all-inclusive - there are great deals to be found. That's just one small part of the process, however. The Net can help you to choose a in the first place, using sites that cover the whole world as well as those focusing on particular countries or cities and to decide where you want to stay and how you're going to spend your time.

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Multiple-choice cloze: The main focus is on vocabulary, e.g. idioms, collocations, fixed phrases, complementation, phrasal verbs, semantic precision. Videos Link 1 Video showing how to solve 8 random multiple choice cloze sentences. Link 2 Example test 1 - solution and advice. Link 3 Example test 2 - solution and advice.

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These days, more and more people are living to see their 100th birthday, as life expectancy around the world increases.

A 2021 study determined that the maximum possible human lifespan is between 120 and 150 years, however, very few of us are likely to make it that far.

On January 17 2023, nun Lucile Randon, who held the Guinness World for the world's oldest person sadly passed away, aged 118.

So just who is the oldest person in the world now?

Let's find out.

Who is the oldest living person in the world?

According to Guinness World Records, following the death of Randon, on January 17, Maria Branyas Morera is now the oldest person alive.

Spaniard Branyas Morera is currently 115 years and 320 days old, making her a supercentenarian (the name given to anyone over 110 years of age).

However, there are a few unverified claims to Branyas Morera's title.

South African woman Johanna Mazibuko, who holds ID papers which say she was born in 1894, turned 128 in May 2022.

Meanwhile Brazilian great-grandmother Maria Gomes dos Reis allegedly reached the age of 122 in June 2022.

Branyas Morera was born in San Francisco in 1907 to an expatriate Catalan family, but later relocated to Barcelona with her mother and sister, after her father died from tuberculosis.

During the Spanish civil war, she worked as a nurse alongside her doctor husband Joan Moret, with whom she had three children.

Since 2000, Branyas Morera has lived in a nursing home in Catalonia and in March 2020, she became the oldest person to recover from Covid 19.

Following her recovery, in a interview with The Observer, she called for better treatment of the elderly: 'This pandemic has revealed that older people are the forgotten ones of our society.

'They fought their whole lives, sacrificed time and their dreams for today's quality of life. They didn't deserve to leave the world in this way'

Who is the oldest person of all time?

The only person verified to have lived past 120 was French citizen Jeanne Calment, who lived for 122 years and 164 days before her death in 1997.

Jeanne, who was born in 1875, outlived both her daughter and grandson, and was declared the oldest person ever to have lived in 1995.

Again, there are other unverified contenders for this title, including 128-year-old Johanna from South Africa.

Another woman, Francisca Susano, was reportedly aged 124 at the time of her November 2021 death.

Francisca, affectionately known as Lola Iska, was believed to have been born in the Philippines in 1897.

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Local government officials said she was the oldest person in the world, surpassing the previous record-holder by two years.

It is thought Guinness World Records were examining documents as recently as September 2021, but she died before they could independently verify her age.

MORE : World's oldest known person who enjoyed a glass of wine every day dies at 118

MORE : David Foster admits it's 'different' having a toddler at 73 after five grown-up daughters, oldest being 52

MORE : Gran, 100, who is NHS's oldest volunteer honoured by King
Follow Metro across our social channels, on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram Share your views in the comments below

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These days, more and more people are living to see their 100th birthday, as life expectancy around the world increases. A 2021 study determined that the maximum possible human lifespan is between 120 and 150 years, however, very few of us are likely to make it that far.

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Rendering pork fat results in two wonderful ingredients, crispy pork lard and butter-like texture pork lard. In most Chinese dishes, pork lard is the choice of oil used as it contributes delicious flavours. To enhance the taste of a dish, crispy pork lard is sometimes sprinkled on top. It not only serves the purpose of garnishing but also adds delicious bites of crispiness to the dish.

It is not advisable to consume pork lard on a daily basis as it is high in calories, unless that is your preference. That being said, it is actually a secret ingredient to many Chinese traditional dishes. That explains why meals from your grandma always taste better. It's all due to the usage of pork lard. The process to making crispy pork lard is rather simple but do ensure it is fragrant, clean and clear. Let's go through with the basics and tips to achieve that.

Which part of pork fats to use?

There are three parts of the pig where pork fats can be obtained. Depending on which part is used, there is a difference in flavour among them.

Leaf lard

The fat which surrounds the kidney and also found within the loins of a pig. It is the highest quality of lards as it has little to no pork smell or taste.

Results in clear and clean lard. Best for making delicious flaky crusts.

Fat back

Found on the back of the pig.

Often rendered and used in stir-fried and sautéed dishes. This is the best for making crispy pork lard.

Belly

From the belly of the pig. Comes between layers of meat.

Separate the fats from the meat. Also used in stir-fried and sautéed dishes. Fats from the belly is used in this recipe. You'll be able to use the meat along with the rendered fats and crispy lard.

Where to buy pork fats?

The different types of pork fats are usually sold at the butcher and sometimes in supermarkets. If you are unable to find any leaf lard or fat back, choose pork belly with thicker layer of fats. This helps when separating the fats from the meat.

How to make clear lard?

Rendering pork lard can be a little tricky. It's best to begin at medium heat to allow the pork fats to sweat and release its oil. Once the oil is released, continue heating the pork fats over low heat. This will ensure that the pork lard is not over heated, hence resulting in nice clear lard.

How to make fragrant and crispy pork lard?

Preparing fragrant and crispy pork lard begins with chopping the pork fats into equal sizes before frying. You may want to place the pork fats in the freezer for 10 minutes before chopping them as the coldness will harden the fats. Otherwise, the rubbery texture of the fats makes it difficult to cut them into equal sizes.

The next step is blanching the chopped pork fats in boiling water. This removes the pork smell as well as impurities from the fats. You'll noticed the dirt floating during the blanching process.

Lastly, when frying the pork lard, do not remove them if bubbles are still noticeable in the oil. This indicates that there is moisture in the pork fats.

Storing pork lard

Fried pork lard is best eaten immediately after frying. Otherwise, cool them to room temperature before storing them unrefrigerated in an air-tight container lined with a piece of kitchen paper at the bottom. Stored this way, the crispy pork lard can be kept for up to a week. Do place the air-tight container in a cool area away from the sunlight. Refrigerated crispy pork lard will turn chewy and lose their crispiness.

Rendered pork lard should be stored in an air-tight container and kept in the refrigerator. It should last for a year if properly rendered. Before using pork lard, do check if there is a rancid smell. Do not use if it does.

Mold on pork lard

Do not consume pork lard that is moldy. This indicates the presence of moisture and that it was not fried and rendered properly.

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Crispy Pork Lard - Southeast Asian Recipes

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Crispy pork lard is the key ingredient to many Chinese dishes such as KL Hokkien mee and Bak Chor mee in Malaysia and Singapore. Although high in calories, it is worth savouring the flavour. This is a recipe for crispy pork lard and clear pork lard oil.

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Man or beast? | LearnEnglish Teens (britishcouncil.org)

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© British Council The United Kingdom's international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities. A registered charity: 209131 (England and Wales) SC037733 (Scotland).

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Listen to the radio programme about Being a Beast by Charles Foster and do the exercises to practise and improve your listening skills.

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According to projections, there will be the greatest job vacancies for candidates with a Mechanical engineering degree (17,900 jobs each year), second for those with an Electrical engineering degree (12,300 jobs per year), and finally for those with a Mechatronics degree (10,800 jobs annually).

Minimum education (time needed to start a profession), average earnings, and annual job opportunities are all factors that must be taken into consideration if we are to determine a winner. It turns out that earning a degree in mechatronics is beneficial.

In addition, if you are interested in a career in mechatronics, you might begin working in the field as soon as 10 to 12 weeks with this short certificate course right after graduating from high school.

If you decide later that mechatronics is a career you would like to pursue, you can enroll in a 2- or 4-year bachelor's program while continuing your job and generating income.

Image by Freepik

What Is the Role of a Mechatronics Engineer?

Industrial sectors like automotive, aerospace, aviation, manufacturing, and oil & energy typically employ mechatronics experts. They are in charge of several jobs and responsibilities, such as:

Locating areas of an organization where tasks can be merged or automated.

Making mechatronic equipment that may be used for either industrial or consumer applications.

Developing systems and controls that are computer-driven and intelligent for use in a business.

Testing equipment and procedures while they are in operation.

Analyzing, modeling, and conducting feasibility studies for new mechatronic solutions.

Putting into practice effective solutions across their larger operation.

Identifying and resolving issues with current mechatronic systems and gadgets.

What Jobs Are Available in Mechatronics?

Project management positions can be attained with a degree in mechatronics. Mechatronics technicians are frequently employed in laboratories, processing facilities, and engineering design offices.

Mechatronics experts are needed in telecommunications, computer science, automobile engineering, robotics, artificial intelligence, consumer goods, and packaging.

Mechatronic specialists commonly have the following job titles:

Automotive Engineer

Control System Engineer

Data Logging Engineer

Instrumentation Engineer

Project Engineer

Aircraft Engineer

Robotics Engineer

What Skills Do I Need to Start a Career in Mechatronics?

You can start an entry-level job in mechatronics using the information and skills you'll gain by earning a certificate in the subject. Utilizing the equipment, software, and resources used in contemporary production scenarios will give you a practical learning experience.

In addition, you will also learn about industrial robots, electrical schematics, computer-aided design, and other technology-related subjects that will prepare you for a cutting-edge job.

Additionally, if you enjoy technology and wish to work in manufacturing, you can consider pursuing further study in the mechatronics discipline. Mechatronics technicians have an advantage if they hold an associate's degree or a brief postsecondary certificate before employment while hiring standards vary by industry.

We provide a specific guide to help you enter the field in just 10 weeks if you are truly considering pursuing a mechatronics career.

The field of mechatronics has a bright future. With a degree in mechatronics engineering, you might set yourself up for a rewarding career at the cutting edge of technological development. These degrees provide the ideal blend of mechanical engineering, electronic engineering, electrical engineering, and computer systems education that can boost your career.

A career in mechatronics is well-paid. The median salary for mechatronics technicians is $60,360. However, there is no reason why you cannot make the top-end average income of $98,070 if you are prepared to put in the required effort and demonstrate the required potential.

In this article, we examined the opportunity cost of a mechanical engineering degree in comparison to other related engineering degrees. It is obvious that a mechatronics degree offers many potentials due to the lowest entrance requirements for a job and pay that are better than or on par with those of other engineering specialties like Electrical, Mechanical, or Electronics Engineering.

We even looked at the potential for industry growth, and when we stepped back and considered the wider picture with all these factors, it became obvious that earning a degree in mechatronics is definitely worth it!

The finest part of the certificate is that Amazon will directly offer you a job, perhaps allowing you to recover your certificate cost within six months.

We really hope that this information was helpful to you in making a career decision. From everyone at Unmudl, we wish you the very best for a prosperous future.

Frequently Asked Questions

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According to projections, there will be the greatest job vacancies for candidates with a Mechanical engineering degree (17,900 jobs each year), second for those with an Electrical engineering degree (12,300 jobs per year), and finally for those with a Mechatronics degree (10,800 jobs annually).

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Sergeant Frank Spike sat behind his desk and stared out of the window. Outside, a steady stream of traffic passed by, each car moving slowly in the cold, grey rain.

Frank looked down at the grey hairs on his arms, and his round stomach, which pushed against the desk. This was his final month before he retired from the police, and, for Frank, retirement couldn't come soon enough.

Frank frowned as he considered the terrible retirement package he had been given. It was barely enough money to take a short holiday on the cold and rainy east coast of England where he lived. There was no way he could afford the round-the-world, luxury cruise he had always dreamed of.

Just as Frank was sighing heavily, Inspector Spencer came up to his desk, with his perfect white teeth and enthusiastic smile. Three years earlier, Spencer had been promoted. Now he had the position of inspector at the young age of forty. Frank, in comparison, had worked for the police for forty years and been passed over for promotion three times. It was true he had neither the looks nor charm of Spencer - sorry, Inspector Spencer - but the younger man didn't have Frank's 'nose for crime'. That nose meant Frank could get inside the mind of the criminal and solve the trickiest of cases. As a result, the younger man often asked for Frank's help. In fact, it was pretty much the only time Spencer spoke to him.

'Hey, Frank, do you mind if I ask your advice about something?'

Unsurprised, Frank nodded.

'Have you heard of the Babbingtons?'

Everyone had heard of the Babbingtons. Ronald Babbington was the millionaire owner of Babbington Oil, and his wife Tabitha was a model. Together they enjoyed nothing more than showing off how rich they were. They often appeared in magazines like Hello!, with their gorgeous house and collection of sports cars. Most recently, they had invited the press to take photographs of the enormous diamond Ronald had bought for his bride. Under the protection of a sophisticated alarm system, the diamond sat in a large gold and glass case. The case stood at the end of a long, red carpet.

Spencer paused for dramatic effect, then explained.

'We've had some secret information about a plan to steal the Babbington diamond!'

Frank raised his eyebrows in an attempt to look suitably impressed.

'Peggy, the owner of the Dog and Duck pub, heard a couple of local criminals talking about it. She's asked that we keep her identity secret of course. But our officers have made some discreet inquiries that seem to confirm what Peggy says.'

Frank nodded again and waited for the inevitable question.

'So?' Spencer asked. 'What do you think is the best thing to do? After all, it's only a rumour. We've got nothing concrete to arrest them on.'

Frank looked thoughtfully out of the window. He remembered his retirement money. He didn't want to be alone in his retirement, but the money wouldn't even be enough to buy a cat to keep him company.

The sound of a car horn brought him back to the case. He put his fingers together under his chin to look as if he was thinking deeply. Which he was, but not quite in the direction Inspector Spencer expected.

'Listen, do this the clever way,' said Frank, leaning towards the younger officer. 'What you need to do is let them commit the crime. If you catch them red-handed, you've got all the evidence you need, no problem.'

'But, Frank,' said Spencer, 'we'd need the approval of the Babbington family. And there are laws about tricking criminals like that, you know!'

'That's why you let them commit the crime. Then, apparently by chance, stop them for speeding as they escape the crime scene. You search the car to find the diamond, and you've caught them red-handed! Plus, the owner of the pub is protected, and you have all the evidence you need.'

'Hmmmm. OK.' Spencer was uncomfortable with the methods Frank was suggesting. But he couldn't deny the plan would work.

Frank continued, 'Of course, you need to ensure the arresting officer is someone you know is reliable.'

Spencer understood immediately.

'Are you sure you want to do it, Frank? It could be dangerous.'

'I'll make sure I'm with a couple of tough young officers, but, yes, of course I want to do it.'

'Why?' asked Spencer. 'You're just about to retire! Don't you want to take it easy?'

'That's exactly why I want to do it,' Frank replied. 'My last case will be my final chance for glory!'

*****

A few days later, Frank went into the Dog and Duck pub after work.

'Did you get it?' he asked Peggy as she handed him his drink.

'Yes. I am now the proud owner of a perfect replica Babbington diamond,' she said. 'I told the glassmaker I was a huge fan of the Babbingtons and that my mean boyfriend wouldn't buy me a diamond of my own.'

'You need a new boyfriend,' said Frank. 'If I were your boyfriend, I'd buy you a diamond ring and take you on a long luxury cruise if I had the chance.'

'Oh, really?' she said and smiled.

*****

Frank was sitting in the back seat of the police car, which was hidden on the road through the woods to the Babbington mansion. In the front seats were two young officers who were strong and reliable.

At 23.30, a message had come in on the police radio. The burglars had met outside the Dog and Duck pub. At 23.37, the young man started the car and left the pub. In the passenger seat was a tall, athletic woman.

At midnight, the pair passed the hidden police car on their way to the mansion. At 00.13, the woman threw heavy ropes over one of the mansion's garden walls. A second hidden police team watched her climb over, while the man waited in the car.

At 00.20, the woman reappeared at the top of the wall with an excited smile on her face. She climbed quickly down the rope before pulling it down with her and running back to the car. Smiling in triumph, the man waited for her to jump in and then sped off in the car.

*****

At 00.23, the thieves passed Frank's car. The young police officer in the driver's seat immediately switched on the flashing blue lights and followed them.

Inside the car, the thieves panicked.

'What are they doing here?' the man shouted. 'I thought you said you turned off the alarms?'

'Relax, I did,' she replied. 'They couldn't have got here this fast anyway. They're just traffic police. Just keep calm and act normally and we can walk away from this with the diamond.'

The man slowed their car to a stop and pressed the button that lowered his window.

'Is there a problem, officer?' he asked, his face shiny with nervous sweat.

'You were speeding. We'll need to give you a ticket. Can you both get out of the car, please?'

The man still looked nervous. While one officer wrote out the speeding ticket and the other stood by ready to get involved if things turned nasty, Frank began thoroughly searching the car.

'Hey, what's he searching the car for?' the woman said. But she knew the game was over.

Frank breathed heavily as he knelt down and started lifting up the rubber mats underneath the seats. His hand felt something smooth, hard and cold under the front passenger car seat. The Babbington diamond! He took the diamond and put it in his jacket pocket. At the same time, with his other hand, he took a very similar object out of his trouser pocket. He held it up.

'OK, you two!' he said. 'You are under arrest for robbery!'

*****

While the young police officers arrested and handcuffed the criminals, Frank held the evidence up for everyone to admire. It shone rainbow colours as it caught the light from the moon.

The two officers sighed in appreciation.

'I've never seen a real diamond up close,' said one.

'Imagine someone giving you that as a present!' said the other.

'Just imagine,' Frank agreed. He carefully put it into an evidence bag. Half an hour later, back at the station, he handed it over to Spencer. Spencer took it from him carefully, as if it was a newborn baby.

*****

Five weeks later, Frank was sitting in his new luxury massage chair and drinking a glass of the finest champagne. His expensive new cat rubbed her tail around his legs, and he reached down to stroke her.

With a satisfied sigh, he leaned over and picked up the local newspaper. The two burglars had got six years in prison. The accompanying photo was of the Babbingtons happily showing off the diamond inside its new, extra-thick glass case. Frank looked closely at the photo of the diamond.

Only a jewellery expert would spot anything strange about the Babbington diamond. And even then, only if they saw the stone up close.

Frank put the newspaper down and picked up one of the travel magazines on his beautiful new coffee table.

'Peggy?' he said. 'Would you like to go to the Bahamas or the Maldives?'

Peggy put down her own champagne glass, a small diamond ring on her finger shining in the light. 'Why not both?' she smiled.

'I did promise you a long cruise,' he said.

'You did!' she replied. 'I'm so glad I called you first when I heard them talking about that robbery.'

'Me too, Peggy,' he said. 'Me too.'

Retirement was turning out to be a wonderful thing after all.
Story written by Clive Lane and adapted by Nicola Prentis

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Sergeant Frank Spike is not a successful police officer. But he has 'a nose for crime'. Will his last case change his luck?

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Our new green high street is beautiful. But we don't have long to admire it. The judge says we're guilty of a crime. Several crimes in fact, including theft, vandalism and disturbing the peace. I get sentenced to 150 hours of community service and Janey gets 300 hours because it was her idea.

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simply that people with tone deafness (or' amusia") are unable to sing in tune, they are also unable to discriminate between tones or recognize familiar melodies.

Congenial amusia , the inability to distinguish pitches.

while most people can easily distinguish differences smaller than that, when listening to melodies which have had a single note altered so that it is out of key with the rest of the melody, do not notice a problem

it might be expected that a musical impairment may be caused by a language impairment. Studies suggest, however, that language and music ability are independent of one another

Moreover, while amusics show deficiencies in their recognition of pitch differences in melodies, they show no tonal languages, such as Chinese, do not report having any difficulty discriminating between words that differ only in their intonation.

New studies, however, have suggested that the deficits in amusics are located outside the auditory cortex. Brain scans of amusics do not show any reaction at all to differences smaller than a half step, when changes in tones are large, their brains overreact, showing twice as much activity on the right side of the brain as a normal brain hearing the same thing.

The more important question now becomes one of normality

Darwin believed that music was adaptive as a way of finding a mate, but who needs to be able to sing to find a partner in an age when it is possible to express your emotions through a song on your IPod?

it must be done to determine whether lack of musical ability is actually detrimental in any way. If no disadvantages can be found of having amusia, then it is no more a disability than having poor fashion sense or bad handwriting.

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It is not simply that people with tone deafness (or' amusia") are unable to sing in tune, they are also unable to discriminate between tones or recognize familiar melodies.An amusia (a person who has the condition of amusia) can distinguish between two pitches that are far apart, but cannot tell the difference between intervals smaller than a half step on the Western diatonic scale, while most people can easily distinguish differences smaller than that, when listening to melodies which have had a single note altered so that it is out of key with the rest of the melody, do not notice a problem.Recent work has been focused on locating the part of the brain that is responsible for amusia. Looking only at the research of Peretz in the field of neuropsychology of music, it would appear that amusia is some sort of disorder.Musical ability is culturally valued, and may have been a factor in survival at one point in human history, but it does not seem likely that it is being selected for on an evolutionary scale any longer.Before, amusia can be declared a disability, further research must be done to determine whether lack of musical ability is actually detrimental in any way. 

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It is not simply that people with tone deafness (or' amusia") are unable to sing in tune, they are also unable to discriminate between tones or recognize familiar melodies.An amusia (a person who has the condition of amusia) can distinguish between two pitches that are far apart, but cannot tell the difference between intervals smaller than a half step on the Western diatonic scale, while most people can easily distinguish differences smaller than that, when listening to melodies which have had a single note altered so that it is out of key with the rest of the melody, do not notice a problem.Recent work has been focused on locating the part of the brain that is responsible for amusia. Looking only at the research of Peretz in the field of neuropsychology of music, it would appear that amusia is some sort of disorder.Musical ability is culturally valued, and may have been a factor in survival at one point in human history, but it does not seem likely that it is being selected for on an evolutionary scale any longer.Before, amusia can be declared a disability, further research must be done to determine whether lack of musical ability is actually detrimental in any way. 

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self-effacing

self-deprecating

humble

unpretentious

unassuming

unpresuming

unostentatious

low-key

free from vanity

shy

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A2 Listening Practice

This page will help you practise for the KEY and PTE General level 1 exams

Describing people
Listen to Kevin and Maria. They are talking about Maria and her sister, Catherine. Choose true or false.

Accommodation
Robert is going to a conference next month. He phones different places to find accommodation.

Free time
Listen to Richard and Molly talking about plans for the weekend. Complete the timetables with their activities.

Daily routine
Mo is a supervisor at a summer camp, Canyon Falls. She is talking to the new camp leaders about the work on the camp.

Shopping
Anna is staying with her friend, Robert. Today, Robert has to work. Listen to their conversation. Complete the sentences with one of the words in the word box.

Weather
Listen to two friends talking about some old sayings about the weather. Match the ends to the beginnings of the sentences to complete the sayings. There are more endings than you need!

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cefr a2 vocab words ket- free reading practice  exam practice english language elt efl grammar writing structure cambridge business exercises a2

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Practice vocabulary exercises that will help you prepare for your English exam

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Practice IELTS reading tests with different topics: Recent Actual Tests, Science, Nature and environments, and more…

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Making a change How easy is it for us to change our lives - and why?

In 1990, a young American named Christopher McCandless gave up his career plans, left behind everyone he knew, including his family, and went off on an adventure. He was 22 at the time. In an act of kindness, he donated all his savings to the famous charity, Oxfam International, and hitchhiked his way through America to Alaska. His decisions were so unusual for his age that Jon Krakauer wrote a book about them called Into the Wild, and Sean Penn directed a film that had the same title.

Of course, this is an unusual story. Most college graduates would not do quite the same thing. However, studies do show that in teenage years, people are more likely to try out new experiences. Instead of following the family career path, for example, and working his way up the same organisation like his grandfather did, a 15-year-old may dream about becoming a traveller - only to find in his early 20s that this fascination with new places is declining and change is less attractive. This age-related trend can be observed in all cultures.

The reason why people all over the world become less keen to change as they get older may be because people's lives generally follow similar patterns and involve similar demands. Most people, wherever they are, aim to find a job and a partner. As they get older, they may have young children to look after and possibly elderly family members. These responsibilities cannot be achieved without some degree of consistency, which means that new experiences and ideas may not have a place in the person's life. New experiences may bring excitement but also insecurity, and so most people prefer to stay with the familiar.

However, not every individual is the same. One toddler may want to play a different game every day and get fed up if nothing changes at the nursery. Another may seek out and play with the same children and toys on every visit. Young children who avoid new experiences will grow up to be more conventional than others. Psychologists argue that those who have more open personalities as children are more open than others might be when they are older. They also suggest that young men have a greater interest in novelty than women, although, as they age, this desire for new experiences fades more quickly than it does in women.

The truth is that, as we get older, we prefer the things we know. We tend to order the same meals in restaurants, sit on the same side of the train when we commute to work, go on holiday to the same places and construct our day in the same way. If you are older than 20, remember that your openness to new experiences is slowly declining.

So you are better off making a new start today than postponing it until later.

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Making a change How easy is it for us to change our lives - and why? - IELTS reading practice test

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Making a change How easy is it for us to change our lives - and why? reading practice test has 6 questions belongs to the General Training subject. All of the questions are YES-NO-NOT GIVEN form

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Tourism

In this pre-advanced vocabulary lesson about Tourism, you will learn about common places to visit, verbs and idioms related to travel, and adjectives to describe different types of places. Check the pictures below and read the definitions and sentence examples to enhance your tourism-related vocabulary.

Places to go

1 Tourist attractions are places such as monuments, famous buildings, and museums that are popular among visiting tourists. Tourist attractions are often crowded because many people want to see them.

2 A seafront is a coastal part of a town or city that faces the sea. People often walk along the seafront so they can look out to sea. Many seafronts have cafes facing them where one can sit and admire the view.

3 Backstreets are narrow streets behind the busy main streets, often in a poorer area of town. They are usually quieter than main streets as they don't contain many shops and are therefore not usually used by tourists.

4 Amusement parks are outdoor areas where people can enjoy rides, games, and other forms of entertainment. Many are only open at certain times of the year, as they are not usually equipped to deal with bad weather.

5 Ruins are the remains of buildings, cities, or monuments that are in a state of disrepair.

6 Hiking trails are paths through mountains or forest areas that are marked out for walkers. Hiking trails can vary in length, with some stretching hundreds of kilometres.

7 Food markets are covered outdoor areas with many different vendors selling various types of food. People enjoy visiting food markets and sampling the different types of food.

8 Nature reserves are parks, forests, or other outdoor areas that are managed to protect their plants and wildlife. Many people visit nature reserves to enjoy the flowers, trees, and views.

9 A crafts fair is an event where people gather to showcase and sell handmade items, often including artwork, jewelry, pottery, and other unique crafts.

Verbs and idioms

1 If you go off track, you go away from the popular tourist routes. Many tourists often go off track to get a more authentic taste of a place.

2 To make a reservation means to book something ahead of time. People often make reservations at restaurants to ensure that they get a table.

3 To chill out means to relax and take it easy. You can chill out at home by relaxing on the sofa, but you can also chill out on holiday sitting on a beach or in a bar. Unwind is similar to chilling out. When you unwind, you relax and forget about work and the stresses of daily life.

4 To stroll means to walk at a leisurely pace, with no particular aim. You can through the streets of a town, taking in the buildings and sights, or you can stroll down a country lane and enjoy the natural surroundings.

5 If you hit the shops, you go shopping, usually for clothes, presents, or souvenirs. People often hit the shops when on holiday to buy things that they can't get at home.

6 To sample the local cuisine means to taste the food of the area that you're visiting. Many tourists enjoy sampling the local cuisine in markets or local restaurants.

7 If you pack your bags, you put your clothes and belongings in a suitcase or rucksack. People pack their bags when preparing to go on or return from a trip or holiday.

8 To take a detour means to take a different route to a place in order to avoid something or save time. People often take detours because of traffic, road closures, or building work.

9 We use the verb form go on before nouns related to travel, trips or similar, such as holiday, trip, journey, excursion, tour, cruise, safari, etc.

Adjectives to describe places

1 Unspoilt or unspoiled means in its natural state, not ruined or changed by humans. We are more likely to describe the countryside as unspoilt than we are a city or town.

2 Remote is a word we use to describe a place that is isolated and far from transport links. Remote areas are usually unspoilt because very few people visit them.

3 Off the beaten track means away from areas and attractions that are usually visited by tourists. Many people like to find somewhere off the beaten track because they are seeking peace and relaxation.

4 If a place is touristy, it's not very nice because it's full of tourists and things for tourists to buy or do. Areas with monuments, galleries, and famous buildings are usually very touristy.

5 Picturesque and 6 breathtaking are both words that we use to describe a place or view that is very attractive. Picturesque means beautiful, like a scene from a picture or postcard, whereas breathtaking means so beautiful that it takes your breath away.

7 Something or somewhere that is overrated is said to be better than it actually is. Restaurants are often described as overrated when the food is not as good as you expected it to be.

8 Vibrant or lively means full of life, so a city or place that is vibrant or lively usually has many things going on and lots of things to do.

9 Exotic means exciting or unusual because it comes from or is characteristic of a different place. We can describe a place as exotic, but we can also use the word to describe food, music, or people too.

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Tourism - B2 English Vocabulary - Test-English

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Boost your travel vocabulary with the pictures, examples, exercises, and games in this comprehensive English vocabulary lesson about Tourism.

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Charles Darwin - a genius remembered. Advanced English

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The name of Charles Darwin is known all over the world, and Darwin is remembered as one of the greatest scientists of all time

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Have you ever wondered what happens in the teenage brain? Read and find out.

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The Mice In Council

One day a group of mice decided to call a meeting to see what they could do about the cat which was always trying to catch them. They talked about lots of plans but none of them seemed like they would work. At last, a young mouse got up and said that a bell should be hung around the cat's neck so all the mice would be able to hear when he was coming closer. All the mice thought this was an excellent idea. However, an older mouse got up and spoke, "This is a really good idea but who is going to tie the bell around the cat's neck?"

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Your first ecording of the moral story mice and the cat 

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Your first ecording of the moral story mice and the cat 

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Listen to Emily talking about the importance of managing her stress levels and the techniques she uses.

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English Test - Grammar Tenses Mix :: Learn English online - free exercises, explanations, games, teaching materials and plenty of information on English language.

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1. use HAVE Present perfect negative notion or present perfect continuous  positive notion,because of for

2. Past tense negative with did , and BE past tense is WAS or WERE

3. Evidence +going to

4. Last summer , simple past

5. Simple past from the sentence 4

6. Before with simple past , and the second half is HAD

7. While , two things at the same time

8. Simple past with fact

9. Fact and simple past

10. At the moment present continuous

11. Present perfect HAVE already

12. I think+ will

13. Facts

14. Speculation , with will

15. Maybe next future speculative concept with will

16. Modal verb and present perfect Already

A/As when while  in the past two things happen at the same time

I WAS WASHING DISHED WHILE MARIA WAS COOKING

AS PETER ENTERD THE BATHROOM MARIA CAME HOME FROM THE BANK

WHEN PETER WAS CHECKING HIS EMAILS HIS BOSS RANG HIM

B/Please be careful about the factual statement , they are just fact , fact of the past fact of the present or fact of the future , just facts

C/I hope , I believe , Maybe , I promise , I am sure , I think ....with will

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PLEASE REMEMBEER

BEFORE + SIMPLE PAST

AFTER + HAD

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WANT TO PASS

my English exam successfully next year, I (study)

harder this term.

EXTERNAL INFLUENCE .....CALLS FOR GOING TO

AS I WAS TOLD , HOW MUCH I SHOULD SPEND, I AM GOING TO LOOK AT THE MNEW JEWELLERY SHOPE IN AVION

MY BOSS TOLD ME I NEED TO MAKE NUMBERS 10%MORE SO I AM GOING TO CHASE THE. CLIENTS AND PUSH THEM

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Francis David.

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Yeo recalls painting a playful Cara Delevingne, who wanted to try on costumes and props from his studio as she was sitting

Artist Jonathan Yeo is one of the UK's best-known portrait painters - an art form, he argues, which is as important as ever in an era where tens of millions of selfies are captured every day.

Yeo is best known for his portraits of figures from the world of entertainment, royalty, politics and activism - among them Sir David Attenborough, Idris Elba, Nicole Kidman, Malala Yousafzai, Helena Bonham Carter and Sienna Miller.

His other subjects include former US president George W Bush and former prime minister Sir Tony Blair, as well as the former Duchess of Cornwall, now Queen Camilla, and the late Duke of Edinburgh, Prince Phillip.

A painted portrait, Yeo says, has the ability to encapsulate more aspects of a sitter's personality than a regular photograph.

"A photo is a frozen moment," Yeo tells BBC News. "What you get when you're painting a portrait is a bit of time elapsing. When you're painting a picture, you're working on it one part at a different time, than another. So instead of a static image, you've got lots of different moments captured.

"Your relationship with the subject evolves as you get to know them," he continues. "You see them on different days, and people behave differently, they look different on different days, so you can bring different elements of their personality, mixed up in an interesting way. And you're seeing them with two eyes rather than with a camera, which sees them with one."

Yeo says his aim with portraits is to get across the "unvarnished truth" of the sitter

Yeo's entry to the world of portraits was unconventional. "I've been doing portraits for nearly 30 years now," he explains, "but I never went to art school and so I never had any formal training."

Instead, the artist developed his own techniques and style. "Portraits are not easy, and it was quite good training because it forced me to figure out how to do it."

His self-taught methods led to a successful career, including a show dedicated to Yeo's work at the National Portrait Gallery (NPG) and a host of exhibitions in museums around the world.

"Yeo, the closest we have to a latter-day society portraitist in the spirit of Joshua Reynolds, paints flattering portraits with an old-fashioned Modernist edge," said Fisun Guner of the Arts Desk in his review of Yeo's NPG show.

The artist is now set to put his decades of experience into teaching. Yeo has recorded a series of lessons for BBC Maestro - a commercial service funded by subscriptions where experts share their skills.

Many of Yeo's portraits are of high-profile figures, something which, he says, can be both a blessing and a curse.

"In some ways, if people are well known, they're a bit more used to being scrutinised and having their photograph taken," he notes. "Which can be an advantage, because they're not as awkward at first, but it might also be that you have to scratch a bit harder to remove the public face."

Here is a selection of some of the big names Yeo has painted:

Cara Delevingne

In the mid 2010s, Cara Delevingne's star was still on the rise. As a model, she dominated fashion pages, but she was also forging a career as an actress and author.

Yeo recalls the model, now 31, wanted to have fun and play around more than many of his other sitters - something which ultimately benefitted the resulting portraits he produced in 2015.

"She would come in and and she didn't like to sit still," he recalls. "But she did tend to look around, and we had a whole load of things left over from a party, some glasses and goggles, and she started putting all these things on and playing around.

"So I ended up doing several pictures of her for a museum in Denmark where she was in a different performance mode in each one.

He adds: "My favourite was when she put this Groucho Marks disguise on [pictured top]. So you've got this supermodel who's generally paid quite a lot of money to have her picture taken, and you could barely see that it's her because of these eyebrows."

Taron Egerton

Of the actors he has painted, one that particularly sticks in Yeo's mind is Taron Egerton - whom he captured while he was portraying Sir Elton John in the 2019 biopic Rocketman.

"I thought I'd do something that was more about that idea of elusiveness, and the point where the actor stops and the character starts," he says.

"But also, he was portraying someone we know in the real world, Elton John, who's also got the performance Elton and the private Elton.

"So I thought it was kind of fun to have this picture of him in character in one of the outfits from the movie, but you've hopefully got this sense of a moving target of where the identity is."

Yeo recalls another actor he got on well with during sitting - but who ended up accidentally missing his next show.

"Kristen Scott Thomas was great and said she was going to come to my exhibition in Denmark," he recalls. "She showed up a week early, she had got the dates wrong. She ended up helping me hang the exhibition, but missed the opening!"

Jonathan Ive

One of Yeo's portraits which attracted the most attention was that of Jonathan Ive, who was chief design officer of Apple at the time (2018).

Ive played a key role in developing the look of the iPod, iPhone, iPad and MacBook.

"I was interested in this idea he mentioned one day that he'd always been fascinated by self-portraiture as a kid, and had written his thesis on it," Yeo says.

"So I loved that - this guy had been partially responsible for putting cameras on the iPhone and basically indirectly was responsible for billions of selfies, more than had ever been made when he wrote his thesis.

"I thought that link was lovely, so in the picture he was sort of making a selfie but we flipped it around a bit."

Grayson Perry

One artist painting another artist is surely an intimidating proposition. "It's a bit more stressful," Yeo acknowledges.

He highlights Grayson Perry, an artist who is also well known for dressing as a woman, as an example.

"[Perry] used to come and sit on Wednesdays, that was his day for being [alter-ego] Claire. So I said 'I don't mind what you wear, but it would be helpful if you wore the same thing'.

"And of course he totally ignored that," Yeo laughs, "and one day would come in as a Victorian schoolgirl, another day as a power-dressed 80s businesswoman with bouffant hair.

"I don't know if it was deliberate and he was playing with me. I could've carried on doing that one for years, I always learn so much from him."

At the time Yeo painted Sir Tony, the former prime minister happened to be wearing a poppy at the time of his sittings as it was close to Remembrance Day. The piercing red of of the poppy was noticeable against Sir Tony's grey suit.

Yeo recalls Sir Tony as an impressive communicator - something he was able to observe on the campaign trail.

"To some extent, I would group politicians with actors because they're often quite sophisticated performers," Yeo says. "Tony Blair was very impressive and was good at projecting what he wanted to project, but he used his body language, the way he said things, to suit the purpose.

"I followed some politicians around on an election campaign a long time ago, and you'd see them in different situations, and he would subtly adapt to each situation almost like a mimic would do, taking on the body language and other affectations."

Jonathan Yeo: Portrait Painting is released on the BBC Maestro platform on 24 January.

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Jonathan Yeo: Artist reflects on painting Cara Delevingne and Taron Egerton

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Artist Jonathan Yeo reflects on painting figures such as Cara Delevingne, Taron Egerton and Sir Tony Blair.

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Pienza, Tuscany, Italy

From the lyrical beauty of European agricultural landscapes to intriguing portraits of shamans performing rituals on a frozen Siberian lake - the winning images from the latest Travel Photographer of the Year competition have been announced.

The Slovenian photographer AndreJa Ravnak has won the overall competition to become Travel Photographer of the Year 2023.

Ravnak's work illustrates hop growing in Slovenia, and rolling fields in Italy and the Czech Republic.

South Moravia, near Cejc, Czech Republic

South Moravia, near Cejc, Czech Republic

"There is a subtle elegance about this year's winners. This comes through in both of AndreJa's winning portfolios; one takes us into simple landscapes, with delicate colours and a textural beauty, the other into the hop fields, out of season and undressed, ready for the next planting," says competition founder Chris Coe.

"Neither are obvious subjects, neither photographed at an optimal time of year, and yet they are both engaging and rather beautiful."

Category winners

Chinle, Arizona, USA

Caden Shepard Choi, 14, from the United States, received the title of Young Travel Photographer of the Year 2023.

Her black and white images document how the Navajo people of Chinle, Arizona, produce wool and use it in weaving.

Chinle, Arizona, USA

Here are some of the other category winners in this year's TPOTY competition.

Young Travel Photographer of the Year: Winner, 15-18 years - Lilly Zhang, 17, USA

Exton, Pennsylvania, USA

Lilly Zhang finds joy in preserving beautiful moments as a hobby photographer.

Growing up, she was introduced to photography by her father, later developing her own love for the artform.

Zhang produced a winning series of delicate landscapes shot in Marsh Creek State Park in Pennsylvania, USA.

Young Travel Photographer of the Year: Winner, 14 years & under - Zayan Durrani, 14, USA

Litli-Hrutur volcano, Iceland

Zayan Durrani's images show the erupting Litli-Hrutur volcano in Iceland.

"My father and I took a trip to Iceland to visit an ongoing volcanic eruption. We hiked for 10 miles through rough, mountainous hills and desert, never stopping to rest, just so that we could reach the eruption before it became dark," says Durrani.

"We were in a race against time because a thick, noxious fog was rolling in and we were told that we would have to evacuate the area. I finally got up close to the fiery eruption.

"I was able to capture this picture using a drone."

Portfolio Winner: Landscape & Environment - Armand Sarlangue, France

Skaftafellsjokull glacier, Iceland

Sarlangue's portfolio documents the atmospheric glacial landscapes of the Icelandic highlands.

This 360 degree panorama was captured with a drone. It shows the whole path of glacial waters, from the Skaftafellsjokull glacier, to the glacial lake, to the glacial river, then to the ocean in the background.

Portfolio Winner: Nature, Wildlife & Conservation - Martin Broen, USA

Baja California, Mexico

Martin Broen's impressive black and white work shows the patterns created by the Mobula ray migration in Baja California, Mexico. He is a technical diver and cave explorer, passionate about capturing and sharing the beauty of this planet.

Originally from Argentina and now based in New York, Broen works in Design and Innovation, allowing him to combine his everyday work on sustainability with his passion for nature and underwater photography.

Anilao, Philippines

Broen also won the award for Best Single Image in this category for a colourful picture showing how a discarded glass bottle in the ocean has become a haven for a small, iridescent, yellow Gobby fish.

Portfolio Winner: People & Cultures - Athanasios Maloukos, Greece

Lake Baikal, Siberia

Greek photographer Athanasios Maloukos's portfolio of shamans performing rituals on Siberia's frozen Lake Baikal was the judges' choice in the People and Cultures category.

Portfolio Winner: Visual Stories - Alain Schroeder, Belgium

Manhattan, New York, USA

Alain Schroeder's series focuses on athletes in their 80s and 90s taking part in the USAFT Masters Indoor Athletics Championships.

Dixon Hemphill, 97, of Potomac Valley Track Club, crosses the finish line in the Men 95-99, 200m dash, accompanied by a young woman for safety.

"A terrific series of images that captures an alternative view of ageing in the 21st century," says competition judge, Angie Nicholson.

"Working in black and white helps us to concentrate on the story while still seeing - but not being distracted by - the context."

Best Single Image, People and Cultures Portfolio - Jack Lawson, UK

Lagos, Nigeria

Jack Lawson received the Best Single Image award for his shot of members of the Nigerian National Amputee Football Team, otherwise known as Special Eagles, training on a beach in Lagos.

Best Single Image, Landscape and Environment - Kazuaki Koseki, Japan

Lake Shirakawa, Tōhoku, Japan

"For a period from the end of winter to early summer, Lake Shirakawa is filled with water from melting snow and a 'submerged forest' appears," says Kazuaki Koseki.

"The water in the lake changes colour between light blue and light green, and mist - combined with the reflections which look like a submerged forest - create a fantastic landscape.

"I chose a bluish time before sunrise to erase the reality and emphasize the fantastic sight and set the shutter speed to 30 seconds, to flatten the water surface."

Best Single Image in a Portfolio - F Dilek Yurdakul, Turkey

Chitral, Pakistan

"The Kalash live within the borders of Pakistan and neighbouring Afghanistan, yet their schools are still co-educational," says F Dilek Yurdakul, whose portrait of a young Kalash schoolgirl was made in Chitral, Pakistan.

Single Image Categories

The three MPB One Shot categories challenged photographers to capture each category theme in just a single image.

MPB One Shot Winner: A Quieter Life - Ignacio Palacios, Australia/Spain

A serene image of a lone walker on a white sand dune at La Puna, Argentina.

MPB One Shot Winner: Above, Eye Level, Below - Josien van Geffen, Netherlands

An unusual perspective of the Highline 197 suspension bridge in Reutte, Austria.

MPB One Shot Winner: Leisure & Adventure - Andrea Peruzzi, Italy

Andrea Peruzzi's mage capturing the moment when a Bedouin jumps over a small gorge between rocks in ancient Petra, Jordan.

People's Choice Winner - Rohan Neel Shah, Kenya

The winner in one category was not chosen by the judges.

Decided by a public vote on the TPOTY website, this year's award went to 15-year-old Rohan Neel Shah, and shows a lone wildebeest in the middle of the Great Migration in the Maasai Mara, Kenya.

Amateur and professional photographers from more than 150 countries submitted more than 20,000 images in TPOTY 2023.

The winning images go on display at The Photography & Video Show at the NEC, Birmingham, UK, from 16-19 March and will also be showcased at Xposure in the UAE.

All images subject to copyright

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Travel Photographer of the Year: Lyrical landscapes win awards

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Travel Photographer of the Year awards recognise incredible pictures from around the planet.

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A famous actress is interviewed about her recent work.

Dennis: Joining me this evening on Theatre Hour is the recent winner of the New York Times Actress of the Year award Jenny Longton. She's currently appearing on Broadway in the spectacular musical, Daydreams. Jenny, welcome to the show.

Jenny: Thank you Dennis. It's a pleasure to be here.

Dennis: Your life has been rather hectic recently, wouldn't you say?

Jenny: Oh yes, I haven't had time to take a breath, honestly, for about six months.

Dennis: Tell us what you're up to.

Jenny: Well, Daydreams has been running for three months now but I've been working non-stop since I began working on my new movie.

Dennis: Ah yes, this is quite a departure for you, isn't it?

Jenny: In as much as I have never worked in cinema before, yes it is. I have found it a very rewarding experience and...

Dennis: ...very different challenges compared to the theatre work...

Jenny: Oh, totally. But that's been the great thing. From the audition to when we began shooting, it's just been a steep learning curve for me. You don't have time to sit down and think "what am I doing here? I belong in a little theatre in Kansas"

Dennis: Tell us something about this movie.

Jenny: Well, everyone knows Tom Cruise plays the lead role but it's a team performance to tell you the truth. Yeah, Tom is our quarterback but he has great support all across the field...

Dennis: What position are you in this football team?

Jenny: Me? Oh..I carry the sponge to the injured guys. No, seriously, I play one of Tom's wives. I don't want to give too much away, to spoil things for the listeners, but Tom isn't exactly a good guy in this movie. He treats me pretty bad and plays around with my head a fair bit.

Dennis: What was Tom Cruise like to work with?

Jenny: Oh listen! You know you get all these up and coming actors and people who just say, who just gush away at the big stars and say how wonderful they are, but with Tom it's been great. He put me at ease from the first take and you don't ever feel star struck or....well, that's not exactly true. I was a little in awe on day one. We were out in the desert in Arizona and I just wanted to ask Tom for his autograph. What an amateur. But he makes it simple and that was the key for me.

Dennis: Now you say you don't want to give too much away but you could give us a little taster, couldn't you?

Jenny: Oh sure...this is a superb, dark mystery in the great tradition of cinema. Leaves you guessing right until the final frame. A lotta twists and turns in the plot. And, I gotta say, some great cinematography too. I just mentioned Arizona but we've been moving around in a lot of great areas like Texas, Montana, Oregon and so on.

Dennis: Hmmm...sounds like a bit of a road movie.

Jenny: Ha...no, but Tom is moving around a lot in the story. Mainly to get away from me - well, he can try, can't he?

Dennis: Has the title been confirmed or a release date yet?

Jenny: The movie is gonna be called "Choices" and we are looking at a release date around Christmas.

Dennis: How do you fit in the filming with your work on Daydreams? It can't be possible, can it?

Jenny: I didn't think so either. Err, well, what we did was to do my location shots at the start of filming before Daydreams started, now I am filming either in New York or a little in Chicago too.

Dennis: So you are commuting between New York and Chicago?

Jenny: Yeah....

Dennis: Oh, you don't sound....

Jenny: Well, I mean, it's not ideal. I miss Grace and Larry isn't...

Dennis: Your daughter and husband....

Jenny: Yes, being married with a child doesn't easily allow for you to be getting up at five in the morning for a flight to O'Hare. But we all know this is what I've wanted to do since I can't remember when.

Dennis: A worthwhile sacrifice, wouldn't you say?

Jenny: Oh, positive in that respect. Yeah, sure. The Chicago scenes are almost done now anyway, so I'll be in the Big Apple in a month until the end of shooting.

Dennis: Now, if we can just switch subjects a little.

Jenny: Hmm mm..

Dennis: You raked up a lot of controversy recently when you criticized Broadway's policy on using women in major productions. Were you surprised at people's reactions to that?

Jenny: In what way exactly?

Dennis: Well, it was said you were biting the hand that was feeding you and ...

Jenny: That wasn't fair.

Dennis: You don't think so?

Jenny: It was like I was supposed to keep quiet just because I worked there. Come on - get real. I work there so I have more right than anyone else to make the observations I did. You notice I called them observations, and NOT criticisms.

Dennis: Observations that were quite, erm, let's say, erm - critical.

Jenny: I am far from being a lone voice in stating this opinion. It just happens that I'm well known, starring in a current musical, acting, erm, performing now in this movie with a star like Tom Cruise, and now the press are interested in what I have to say. Was this point any less valid two years ago when I made it?

Dennis: Which you did?

Jenny: Oh, yeah, I can find you the article, or rather the square inch, that my comments appeared in. Look, I think women are getting a raw deal on Broadway currently and I would like to see something done to ensure the huge array of very talented female performers at our disposal are given the chance to shine. That's all I want. A level playing field for everyone.

Dennis: If there are changes to these policies, will you still be around on Broadway or sipping champagne in Hollywood?

Jenny: Oh, no, my heart will always be on the stage. Doing this movie has given me a new aspect to my professional life, but I would never leave that, the theatre side of me I mean, behind.

Dennis: Jenny Longton, as always, it's been great speaking with you. The best of luck with all your projects and come back and see us as soon as possible.

Jenny: Just try and stop me! Thanks for having me on the show Dennis.

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Advanced Listening | Interview with an Actress - Transcript | esl-lounge Student

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A famous actress is interviewed about her recent work. Dennis: Joining me this evening on Theatre Hour is the recent winner of the New York Times Actress of the Year award Jenny Longton. She's currently appearing on Broadway in the spectacular musical, Daydreams. Jenny, welcome to the show. Jenny: Thank you Dennis.

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Look for the words :

What is spectacular? A spectacular musical ,this means amazing , very good

How busy is the woman ? Hectic life , she has had not  time to take a breath

What is her relationship with Tom cruise? he is a superstar , and her co star in a movie , and he is like the quarterback

What is Awe?  star struck

What is gush away ? people say how wonderful they are

What is the controversy issue at Broadway ?Broadway's policy on using women in major productions.

What does it mean : Don’t bite the hand that feeds you

don't criticise employer when you are having profit from it

She wanted the level playing field ?  good acting roles for both genders

What is the metaphor ; I carry the sponge to the injured guys ?  I support them emotionally

What is it “a steep learning curve for me”? I have had a lot to learn

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Rubik's Cube - How the puzzle achieved success

Erno Rubik first studied sculpture and then later architecture in Budapest, where he went on to become a teacher of interior design. It was while he was working as a teacher that he began the preliminary work on an invention that he called the 'Magic Cube'.

Rubik was inspired by geometric puzzles such as the Chinese tangram, a puzzle consisting of various triangles, a square and a parallelogram which can be combined to create different shapes and figures. However, unlike the tangram, which is two- dimensional, Rubik was more interested in investigating how three-dimensional forms, such as the cube, could be moved and combined to produce other forms.

His design consisted of a cube made up of layers of individual smaller cubes, and each smaller cube could be turned in any direction except diagonally. To ensure that the cubes could move independently, without falling apart, Rubik first attempted to join them together using elastic bands. However, this proved to be impossible, so Rubik then solved the problem by assembling them using a rounded interior. This permitted them to move smoothly and easily. He experimented with different ways of marking the smaller cubes, but ended up with the simple solution of giving a different colour to each side. The object was to twist the layers of small cubes so that each side of the large cube was an identical colour.

Rubik took out a patent for the Cube in 1977 and started manufacturing it in the same year. The Cube came to the attention of a Hungarian businessman, Tibor Laczi, who then demonstrated it at the Nuremberg Toy Fair. When British toy expert Tom Kremer saw it, he thought it was amazing and he persuaded a manufacturer, Ideal Toys, to produce 1 million of them in 1979. Ideal Toys renamed the Cube after the toy's inventor, and in 1980, Rubik's Cube was shown at toy fairs all over the world. It won that year's prize in Germany for Best Puzzle. Rubik's Cube is believed to be the world's best-selling puzzle; since its invention, more than 300 million Cubes have been sold worldwide.

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Rubik's Cube - How the puzzle achieved success - IELTS reading practice test

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Rubik's Cube - How the puzzle achieved success reading practice test has 7 questions belongs to the Short Practice subject. All of the questions are Summary, form completion form

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The ballpoint pen

The ballpoint pen

Most of us have at least one, but how did this popular item evolve?

One morning in 1945, a crowd of 5,000 people jammed the entrance of Gimbels Department Store in New York. The day before, Gimbels had placed a full-page advertisement in the New York Times for a wonderful new invention, the ballpoint pen. The advertisement described the pen as 'fantastic' and 'miraculous'. Although they were expensive, $12.50 each, all 10,000 pens in stock were sold on the first day.

In fact, this 'new' pen was not new at all. In 1888, John Loud, a leather manufacturer, had invented a pen with a reservoir of ink and a rolling ball. However, his pen was never produced, and efforts by other people to produce a commercially successful one failed too. The main problem was with the ink. If it was too thin, the ink leaked out of the pen. If it was too thick, it didn't come out of the pen at all.

Almost fifty years later, in 1935, a newspaper editor in Hungary thought he spent too much time filling his pens with ink. He decided to invent a better kind of pen. With the help of his brother, who was a chemist, he produced a ballpoint pen that didn't leak when the pen wasn't being used. The editor was called Ladislas Biro, and it was his name that people would associate more than any other with the ballpoint pen.

By chance, Biro met Augustine Justo, the Argentinian president. Justo was so impressed with Biro's invention that he invited him to set up a factory in Argentina. In 1943, the first Biro pens were produced.

Unfortunately, they were not popular, since the pen needed to be held in a vertical position for the ink to come out. Biro redesigned the pen with a better ball, and in 1944 the new product was on sale throughout Argentina.

It was a North American, Milton Reynolds, who introduced the ballpoint pen to the USA. Copying Biro's design, he produced the version that sold so well at Gimbels. Another American, Patrick Frawley, improved the design and in 1950 began producing a pen he called the Papermate. It was an immediate success, and within a few years, Papermates were selling in their millions around the world.

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The ballpoint pen - IELTS reading practice test

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The ballpoint pen reading practice test has 5 questions belongs to the Short Practice subject. All of the questions are Sentence Completion form

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The world's friendliest city

A team of social psychologists from California has spent six years studying the reactions of people in cities around the world to different situations. The results show that cities where people have less money generally have friendlier populations. Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, which is often known for its crime, comes out top, and the capital of Malawi, Lilongwe, comes third.

But what makes one city friendlier than another? The psychologists from California State University say it has got more to do with environment than culture or nationality.

They carried out a study into the way locals treated strangers in 23 cities around the world. The team conducted their research through a series of tests, where they dropped pens or pretended they were blind and needed help crossing the street.

The study concludes that people are more helpful in cities with a more relaxed way of life such as Rio. While they were there, researchers received help in 93 percent of cases, and the percentage in Lilong we was only a little lower. However, richer cities such as Amsterdam and New York are considered the least friendly. Inhabitants of Amsterdam helped the researchers in 53 percent of cases and in New York just 44 percent. The psychologists found that, in these cities, people tend to be short of time, so they hurry and often ignore strangers.
Complete the table below.
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The world's friendliest city - IELTS reading practice test

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The world's friendliest city reading practice test has 5 questions belongs to the Short Practice subject. All of the questions are Summary, form completion form

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Read an email managing the problems faced by a member of an international team.

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I am writing to you , since you are her team leader , she was given a lot of autonomy , but in her Tokyo office she is used to managerial guidelines and the project is a little daunting , timeline , and her goal posts has been moved , then she has deadlines from her Tokyo department too

Maybe we should be giving her more directions till she learns the ropes and understands her role , could you outline the group and targets and all people get a reminder ..

in this way all have holistic view , and you should touch base with her every now and then to contact her every so often , to make sure she understands all / the overall plan

so she doesn't feel pulled in both directions , Tokyo and here

I think she will be an asset to our company , if properly mentored , ..

please let me know your thoughts ..so she can have more smooth sailing experience

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IELTS General Reading free samples. Sample 2.3 - IELTS-up

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IELTS General Reading practice: sample with auto-correction and answers 2.3.

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You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 13-26, which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.
Trash Talk Sorting through a mountain of pottery to track the Roman oil trade

(A) In the middle of Rome's trendiest neighborhood, surrounded by sushi restaurants and nightclubs with names like Rodeo Steakhouse and Love Story, sits the ancient world's biggest garbage dump-a 150-foot-tall mountain of discarded Roman amphoras, the shipping drums of the ancient world. It takes about 20 minutes to walk around Monte Testaccio, from the Latin testa and Italian cocci, both meaning "potsherd." But despite its size-almost a mile in circumference-it's easy to walk by and not really notice unless you are headed for some excellent pizza at Velavevodetto, a restaurant literally stuck into the mountain's side. Most local residents don't know what's underneath the grass, dust, and scattering of trees. Monte Testaccio looks like a big hill, and in Rome people are accustomed to hills.

(B) Although a garbage dump may lack the attraction of the Forum or Colosseum, I have come to Rome to meet the team excavating Monte Testaccio and to learn how scholars are using its evidence to understand the ancient Roman economy. As the modern global economy depends on light sweet crude, so too the ancient Romans depended on oil-olive oil. And for more than 250 years, from at least the first century A.D., an enormous number of amphoras filled with olive oil came by ship from the Roman provinces into the city itself, where they were unloaded, emptied, and then taken to Monte Testaccio and thrown away. In the absence of written records or literature on the subject, studying these amphoras is the best way to answer some of the most vexing questions concerning the Roman economy-How did it operate? How much control did the emperor exert over it? Which sectors were supported by the state and which operated in a free market environment or in the private sector?

(C) Monte Testaccio stands near the Tiber River in what was ancient Rome's commercial district. Many types of imported foodstuffs, including oil, were brought into the city and then stored for later distribution in the large warehouses that lined the river. So, professor, just how many amphoras are there?" I ask José Remesal of the University of Barcelona, co-director of the Monte Testaccio excavations. It's the same question that must occur to everyone who visits the site when they realize that the crunching sounds their footfalls make are not from walking on fallen leaves, but on pieces of amphoras. (Don't worry, even the small pieces are very sturdy.) Remesal replies in his deep baritone, "Something like 25 million complete ones. Of course, it's difficult to be exact," he adds with a typical Mediterranean shrug. I, for one, find it hard to believe that the whole mountain is made of amphoras without any soil or rubble. Seeing the incredulous look on my face as I peer down into a 10-foot-deep trench, Remesal says, "Yes, it's really only amphoras." I can't imagine another site in the world where archaeologists find so much-about a ton of pottery every day. On most Mediterranean excavations, pottery washing is an activity reserved for blisteringly hot afternoons when digging is impossible. Here, it is the only activity for most of Remesal's team, an international group of specialists and students from Spain and the United States. During each year's two-week field season, they wash and sort thousands of amphoras handles, bodies, shoulders, necks, and tops, counting and cataloguing, and always looking for stamped names, painted names, and numbers that tell each amphora's story.

(D) Although scholars worked at Monte Testaccio beginning in the late 19th century, it's only within the past 30 years that they have embraced the role amphoras can play in understanding the nature of the Roman imperial economy. According to Remesal, the main challenge archaeologists and economic historians face is the lack of "serial documentation," that is, documents for consecutive years that reflect a true chronology. This is what makes Monte Testaccio a unique record of Roman commerce and provides a vast amount of datable evidence in a clear and unambiguous sequence. "There's no other place where you can study economic history, food production and distribution, and how the state controlled the transport of a product," Remesal says. "It's really remarkable."

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Free IELTS Reading samples: Academic Reading test #4.2 - IELTS-up

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IELTS Academic Reading practice: sample 4.2. Read the text and answer the questions online. Finish full IELTS Reading sample to get your score.

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Shocking before and after photos of Ukrainian soldier released by Russia

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The 41-year-old lost almost half his body weight and has been left with several health issues.

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currier

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Tenses

This section is all about English tenses. It contains exercises on every tense - simple and progressive - as well as a section with mixed tense exercises.

Levels of Difficulty : Elementary Intermediate Advanced

Present Tense

Past Tense

Present Perfect

Present Perfect - Past Tense

Past Perfect Tense

Future Tense

All Tenses

Irregular Verbs

Further Exercises

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Online Tense Exercises - English Grammar

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English Grammar Tense Exercises - All exercises can be done online

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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T126-Future Perfect Tense - English Grammar Exercises

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.
We French do love to demonstrate
(A) Josiane Bertrand has a small family business - a neighbourhood charcuterie selling sausage, poached pigs' trotters, pate and jellied pig snouts. Her ham, she says, is the best in Paris and her queue of customers is long. Despite the ceaseless rain outside - among all its other woes, France is now flooding - it's a convivial crowd waiting to be served, and the animated conversation is all about strikes.

(B) If the opinion pages of Le Monde are to be believed, the charcuterie queue is a pretty accurate reflection of the mood of the country. Split, roughly half and half, between those for the Work Bill and those against. Philippe's 28. He's landed what most French would regard as a dream job. He's a fonctionnaire working in local government. A fonctionnaire is an employee of the French state in almost any form of public administration and service. It's a job for life - with solid pay and conditions, fixed working hours, a good pension, generous holidays. So, what many young French people aspire to is not to change the world - explore, create, set-up alone - but, with self-employment difficult and taxes punitive, they dream of becoming steadily employed bureaucrats.

(C) Philippe knows he's lucky. And he's against any change. "I'm happy," he says. "I know exactly where I am and where I'll be in 40 years' time, with a good pension." Eleonore, who has four children, two of them dancing around the shop as they wait, is in her early 40s. As a secondary school teacher she has also got a job for life and generous state benefits. But, unlike Philippe, she's all for change. "It can't go on like this. For every person like me, there are 20 or more with no hope at all," she says.

(D) A quarter of all French people under 25, many of them well-qualified, have no work. A large number of those are from immigrant families, making their chances of employment even slimmer. These are the kind of people who voted Francois Hollande into the presidency in 2012, with his pledge to end the country's employment troubles.

(E) Now he's made a new promise, putting his own political career on the line - he's not running for re-election next spring unless he cuts unemployment. A bold move for a president with an approval rating of only 14% in a country riven by industrial disputes. Along with his prime minister, Manuel Valls, and Pierre Gattaz - known as the "boss of bosses", president of Medef, the largest federation of employers in France - Hollande stands against the combined power of the country's two biggest unions.

(F) The proposed Work Bill runs to over 500 pages. It aims to simplify and liberalise the French Work Code which, at 3,689 pages, is a vast labyrinth beset with perils for employers. The unions won't even consider negotiations until the bill is removed from parliament. The president and his allies refuse to change a word of it. "It's a good law, good for France," says Hollande. The result? Total stalemate. An ongoing siege. Just after one o'clock on the glassed-in terrace of a popular restaurant on the Boulevard Montparnasse, and everything begins to go quiet. The traffic disappears from the street. Cordons of riot police move in, three columns deep, flanked by armoured vans. There's a whirr of helicopters overhead.

(G) In the distance, a gathering roar and blare - the protesters. The noise becomes deafening. The riot police take up positions. Frederique, the waiter, temporarily locks the doors - and those having lunch find themselves exhibits in a kind of transparent, gastronomic showcase along with various grilled fish, bottles of wine and assorted desserts. Looking in from the outside, hundreds of protesters passing down the boulevard, some marching, others ambling, a few dancing to music booming from the accompanying floats. Looking out from the inside, the lunchers. The lunchers comment on the demonstrators, the demonstrators wave cheerily at the lunchers. There's general resigned, amused talk amid the eating - "Here we go again," and "Where will this round end?" And self-deprecating comments such as, "We French do love to demonstrate..."

(H) Then it all subsides, passes on, the noise, the marchers, the red balloons and pounding music, leaving a trailing wake of litter. Frederique unlocks the doors. The conversation leaves the political, returns to the personal. Similar reforms have already been implemented in Italy and Spain. Germany did so long ago - its unemployment, at 5%, is less than half that of France, which according to some commentators here now stands alone as the last bastion of 20th Century-style socialism in Europe.

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IELTS Academic Reading practice test #9.1 - IELTS-up

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You can find full IELTS Academic Reading practice test: sample 9.1 here. Read the text and answer the questions online. Finish full IELTS Reading test to see your score.

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Lost in the Mountains

Two walkers are reported to gone missing near the summit of Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales. John Watkins , aged 21 and Melanie McBrian, 19, by nightfall, leading to fears that they forced to spend the night on the mountain
Weather conditions, when the pair off yesterday morning, were fairly good. By the afternoon , however, it had got much worse. Thick clouds quickly over the region and there was a sharp drop in temperature. The surface of the local lakes to freeze within a few hours. Blizzards began in the evening , with a great deal of snow above 500 metres.

Friends of the two walkers that they from either of them. They think their mobile phones unusable for some reason. Melanie's friend Janet Richards believes Melanie her to say they were alright if her phone properly. Joe Hill , a friend of John's , admits he they an accident last night, but insists they have a lot of experience walking in the mountains of Wales. They shelter if they to stay on the mountain during last night.
Mountain rescue teams, which began looking for the couple early this morning ,say that one or both of the walkers and fallen in bad weather conditions ,especially as neither of them walking in the mountains in winter.
The hope is, though, that they safe before long ,especially as the weather is forecast to clear up within the next few hours.

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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Two walkers are reported to gone missing near the summit of Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales. John Watkins , aged 21 and Melanie McBrian, 19, by nightfall, leading to fears that they forced to spend the night on the mountainWeather conditions, when the pair off yesterday morning, were fairly good.

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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T085 - All Tenses - English Grammar Exercises

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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PV023 - Phrasal Verbs - English Grammar Exercises

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PV022 - Phrasal verbs

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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PV022 -Phrasal Verbs - English Grammar Exercises

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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Prefixes and Suffixes - English Grammar Exercises

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Make the opposite of these words using the following prefixes

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Imagine you had a bank account that deposited $86,400 each morning. The account carries over no balance from day to day, allows you to keep no cash balance, and every evening cancels whatever part of the amount you had failed to use during the day. What would you do? Draw out every dollar each day!

We all have such a bank. Its name is Time. Every morning, it credits you with 86,400 seconds. Every night it writes off, as lost, whatever time you have failed to use wisely. It carries over no balance from day to day. It allows no overdraft so you can't borrow against yourself or use more time than you have. Each day, the account starts fresh. Each night, it destroys an unused time. If you fail to use the day's deposits, it's your loss and you can't appeal to get it back.

There is never any borrowing time. You can't take a loan out on your time or against someone else's. The time you have is the time you have and that is that. Time management is yours to decide how you spend the time, just as with money you decide how you spend the money. It is never the case of us not having enough time to do things, but the case of whether we want to do them and where they fall in our priorities.

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Imagine you had a bank account that deposited $86,400 each morning. The account carries over no balance from day to day, allows you to keep no cash balance, and every evening cancels whatever part of...

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When you think about it, kissing is strange and a bit icky. You share saliva with someone, sometimes for a prolonged period of time. One kiss could pass on 80 million bacteria, not all of them good.

Yet everyone surely remembers their first kiss, in all its embarrassing or delightful detail, and kissing continues to play a big role in new romances.

At least, it does in some societies. People in western societies may assume that romantic kissing is a universal human behaviour, but a new analysis suggests that less than half of all cultures actually do it. Kissing is also extremely rare in the animal kingdom.

So what's really behind this odd behaviour? If it is useful, why don't all animals do it - and all humans too? It turns out that the very fact that most animals don't kiss helps explain why some do.

According to a new study of kissing preferences, which looked at 168 cultures from around the world, only 46% of cultures kiss in the romantic sense.

Previous estimates had put the figure at 90%. The new study excluded parents kissing their children, and focused solely on romantic lip-on-lip action between couples.

Many hunter-gatherer groups showed no evidence of kissing or desire to do so. Some even considered it revolting. The Mehinaku tribe in Brazil reportedly said it was "gross". Given that hunter-gatherer groups are the closest modern humans get to living our ancestral lifestyle, our ancestors may not have been kissing either.

The study overturns the belief that romantic kissing is a near-universal human behaviour, says lead author William Jankowiak of the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. Instead it seems to be a product of western societies, passed on from one generation to the next, he says. There is some historical evidence to back that up.

Kissing as we do it today seems to be a fairly recent invention, says Rafael Wlodarski of the University of Oxford in the UK. He has trawled through records to find evidence of how kissing has changed. The oldest evidence of a kissing-type behaviour comes from Hindu Vedic Sanskrit texts from over 3,500 years ago. Kissing was described as inhaling each other's soul.

In contrast, Egyptian hieroglyphics picture people close to each other rather than pressing their lips together.

So what is going on? Is kissing something we do naturally, but that some cultures have suppressed? Or is it something modern humans have invented?

We can find some insight by looking at animals.

Our closest relatives, chimpanzees and bonobos, do kiss. Primatologist Frans de Waal of Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, has seen many instances of chimps kissing and hugging after conflict.

For chimpanzees, kissing is a form of reconciliation. It is more common among males than females. In other words, it is not a romantic behaviour.

Their cousins the bonobos kiss more often, and they often use tongues while doing so. That's perhaps not surprising, because bonobos are highly sexual beings.

When two humans meet, we might shake hands. Bonobos have sex: the so-called bonobo handshake. They also use sex for many other kinds of bonding. So their kisses are not particularly romantic, either.

These two apes are exceptions. As far as we know, other animals do not kiss at all. They may nuzzle or touch their faces together, but even those that have lips don't share saliva or purse and smack their lips together. They don't need to.

Take wild boars. Males produce a pungent smell that females find extremely attractive. The key chemical is a pheromone called androstenone that triggers the females' desire to mate.

From a female's point of view this is a good thing, because males with the most androstonene are also the most fertile. Her sense of smell is so acute, she doesn't need to get close enough to kiss the male.

The same is true of many other mammals. For example, female hamsters emit a pheromone that gets males very excited. Mice follow similar chemical traces to help them find partners that are genetically different, minimising the risk of accidental incest.

Animals often release these pheromones in their urine. "Their urine is much more pungent," says Wlodarski. "If there's urine present in the environment they can assess compatibility through that."

It's not just mammals that have a great sense of smell. A male black widow spider can smell pheromones produced by a female that tell him if she has recently eaten. To minimise the risk of being eaten, he will only mate with her if she is not hungry.

The point is, animals do not need to get close to each other to smell out a good potential mate.

On the other hand, humans have an atrocious sense of smell, so we benefit from getting close. Smell isn't the only cue we use to assess each other's fitness, but studies have shown that it plays an important role in mate choice.

A study published in 1995 showed that women, just like mice, prefer the smell of men who are genetically different from them. This makes sense, as mating with someone with different genes is likely to produce healthy offspring. Kissing is a great way to get close enough to sniff out your partner's genes.

In 2013, Wlodarski examined kissing preferences in detail. He asked several hundred people what was most important when kissing someone. How they smelled featured highly, and the importance of smell increased when women were most fertile.
It turns out that men also make a version of the pheromone that female boars find attractive. It is present in male sweat, and when women are exposed to it their arousal levels increase slightly.

Pheromones are a big part of how mammals chose a mate, says Wlodarski, and we share some of them. "We've inherited all of our biology from mammals, we've just added extra things through evolutionary time."

On that view, kissing is just a culturally acceptable way to get close enough to another person to detect their pheromones.

In some cultures, this sniffing behaviour turned into physical lip contact. It's hard to pinpoint when this happened, but both serve the same purpose, says Wlodarski.

So if you want to find a perfect match, you could forego kissing and start smelling people instead. You'll find just as good a partner, and you won't get half as many germs. Be prepared for some funny looks, though.

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IELTS Academic Reading practice, sample 3.3 - IELTS-up

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IELTS Academic Reading practice: sample 3.3. Read the text from IELTS Reading test and answer the questions online. Finish full IELTS Reading sample to get your score.

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Read the text about the history of Youtube . Decide which of the four words best fits each space.
YouTube was by three former employees of Paypal, Jawed Karim, Steve Chen and Chad Hurley in 2005. Over a decade later it has become one of the most visited sites in the history of the Internet. Up to then, videos could not be on websites. It was a Janet Jackson Super Bowl incident as well as the southeast Asian tsunami of 2004 that triggered the idea.

In 2005 Sequoia Capital to invest $ 11.5 million in YouTube, a new start-up that that had its first headquarters above a pizzeria in California. In April 2005 , the first ever video, called " Me at the Zoo", was uploaded by co-founder Karim. Half a year later a Nike commercial the first video to receive one million views.

After extremely quick growth, Google bought the company for over $ 1.5 billion . However, the site was comparatively small and hadn't even many other parts of the world. By the end of the decade YouTube had signed contracts with TV stations which uploaded their videos for viewers to watch.

In 2010 YouTube started introducing ads to their videos. As audiences started to the importance of the website, others had the opportunity to a living by posting videos and receiving a small part of the money generated from commercials.

In 2012 , the first every video to hit one billion views was Psy's "Gangnam Style" , shortly after the site announced four billion daily video .

Today YouTube offers such as paid movies and live streaming. 300 hours of video are uploaded every minute. In the years ahead , YouTube will remain the most watched video service and it has already replaced television as a major of news.

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MCC026-The History of Youtube - Multiple Choice Cloze

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Earth Day 2024 | Activities & Resources for April 22 - Earth Day

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For Earth Day 2024, EARTHDAY.ORG is unwavering in our commitment to end plastics for the sake of human and planetary health, demanding a 60% reduction in the production of ALL plastics by 2040.

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New York History - Heading Gap Fill

In the following text, the headings of six sections have been removed. Choose the best heading (A-G) for the six sections (1-6). There is one extra heading you do not need to use. You only need to write the letter in the box.

Use these headings to fill the spaces below. There is one extra you do not need to use.

1. Changing Economy

2. Political Colors

3. Cool Again

4. Crime Hits Hard

5. Hard Times

6. Shifting Populations

7. Homecoming Heroes

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Advanced Reading | New York History - Heading Gap Fill

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Advanced reading exercise to improve your English reading. Title: New York History - Heading Gap Fill.

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Lost in the Mountains

Two walkers are reported to gone missing near the summit of Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales. John Watkins , aged 21 and Melanie McBrian, 19, by nightfall, leading to fears that they forced to spend the night on the mountain
Weather conditions, when the pair off yesterday morning, were fairly good. By the afternoon , however, it had got much worse. Thick clouds quickly over the region and there was a sharp drop in temperature. The surface of the local lakes to freeze within a few hours. Blizzards began in the evening , with a great deal of snow above 500 metres.

Friends of the two walkers that they from either of them. They think their mobile phones unusable for some reason. Melanie's friend Janet Richards believes Melanie her to say they were alright if her phone properly. Joe Hill , a friend of John's , admits he they an accident last night, but insists they have a lot of experience walking in the mountains of Wales. They shelter if they to stay on the mountain during last night.
Mountain rescue teams, which began looking for the couple early this morning ,say that one or both of the walkers and fallen in bad weather conditions ,especially as neither of them walking in the mountains in winter.
The hope is, though, that they safe before long ,especially as the weather is forecast to clear up within the next few hours.

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Two walkers are reported to gone missing near the summit of Snowdon, the highest peak in Wales. John Watkins , aged 21 and Melanie McBrian, 19, by nightfall, leading to fears that they forced to spend the night on the mountainWeather conditions, when the pair off yesterday morning, were fairly good.

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blizzard

/ˈblɪzəd/

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T043-English Tenses

Gap-fill exercise

Fill in all the gaps, then press "Check" to check your answers. Use the "Hint" button to get a free letter if an answer is giving you trouble. You can also click on the "[?]" button to get a clue. Note that you will lose points if you ask for hints or clues!

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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English Tenses 20 - Interactive Grammar Practice

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Fill in the correct form of the verb given

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Disappearance

Hi! I am new here and I am not sure if this has not been posted here before, so forgive me if I am repeating something. I will try to explain what is happening in one particular area in Slovakia. Please note that English is not my mother tongue so if there is any misunderstanding, please write it in a comment.

Slovakia is a country in the middle of the Europe. The biggest mountains here are Carpathian Mountains, and Tribeč is part of Carpathian Mountains. Tribeč is a relatively small and not that high mountain. It is located in the west side of the country. It has a shape of a triangle it is not considered to be somehow dangerous, definitely not the way High Tatras are. The climate is moderate, four seasons, no tornados, no earthquakes, just a normal calm environment with wild animals.

So there is a whole series of missing people in Tribeč, however I believe that most of them could be explained as tragic accidents when animal attacked a victim, preventing the body to be found. However there are some cases that makes me question this whole situation. This is some sort of "urban legend" because there is a book about this, so some people believe it is all just a conspiracy to gain fame, and others believe there is a sinister activity. On the other hand, it is true that people disappeared and have never been found, or their bodies or remains. Now for the cases:

1929 - A. Samšály went missing

22nd of November, heavy snow kept falling on the whole region. That day, A. Samšály, the ranger/forester went missing. And that's it. He just went into the woods and snow made it impossible to find him, until spring. However his body was never found. It is possible that he committed suicide, he has no wife nor children and had a relatively lonely life. But it just seems absurd that his body was never recovered/found, considering how relatively small Tribec is.

1939 - Walter Fischer went missing

Walter Fischer worked in a shoe factory in Patizanske, a small city on the west of the Tribeč Mountains. He worked there from Monday to Saturday and on Sundays he went to visit his wife and children in another small city (none of the sources mention which one). One Sunday, he decided that he won't be visiting his family, but rather go for a hike. His destination, according to testimony of his colleagues, was "Castle Black" or Čierny hrad (yes, like in Game of Thrones). Castle Black is 23 km from Partizanske, which means that if he wanted to come back that day, he was supposed to walk almost 50 km, and most of them are through the woods. Now, note that this was 24th of January (however, 24th January 1939 was Tuesday, not Sunday, so the source or the original source from that time period is wrong), the coldest month in this climate, and it is very, very possible there was snow in the mountains. He went on a hike and disappeared. No one really cared, until his wife 4 weeks later noticed that something is off. (Now, for explanation - the factory in which he worked in didn't give a damn=didn’t care , they had many people waiting for work, so they assumed he just left or something. Though I have no idea why his wife would wait 4 weeks, she could have an affair or whatever, it doesn't really matter anymore I think).

That was it, he disappeared. Until the May 8th. On this day, Walter Fisher was found, and now the interesting part begins. He was found alive but unconscious, with several burns on his face and body. He was found on a field near Zlate Moravce, which is a city 35km from Partizanske, where he was last seen. It is also on the other side of the Tribec mountains. Walter Fischer was found in a bad psychological condition and he spent the rest of his life in a facility for mentally ill people. Please mind that if there were any files for this case, that may very well be destroyed already, because September 1939 is the beginning of WWII. and Slovakia was affected by the war.

1966 - Husband and wife went missing

In 1966, Jan and Alena, married couple went missing. The only track they left was their car, parked approximately 5km behind the Jelenec (another small city near Tribec) near the forrest leading to Tribec. Both Alena and Jan were missing in work since February. In car, there was nothing abnormal, nothing that would indicate a crime. They have never been found and still remain missing to this day. The search was expanded to whole of the Slovakia. According to source, it just somehow looks like they stepped out of the car and disappeared for good.

To any Slovaks here - I know this was/is a hot topic in conspiracy theories, and that some cases are easily explained. I mentioned cases that raised many questions to me and would like to ask if anyone has any rational explanations. There are more missing people, as in any mountain area in the world, but these three are just most weird.

Please note that these cases are old or happened during the uneasy political time (especially the '60s, husband and wife) so there might be a political explanation behind it.

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Cambridge English: C2 Proficiency (CPE) Use of English part 1

Difficulty level: C2 / advanced

In part 1 of the CPE Use of English test you read a text with 15 words missing. You should complete this activity in 20 minutes. This text is about hormones and love.

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cpe  exam practice english language elt efl grammar writing structure cambridge business exercises

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CPE Use of English part 1 - free online practice test

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This is a detective story for medium-level-English students. You can read it just for fun and try and solve the mystery, but you can also then go on to do the accompanying vocabulary and writing quizzes.

Click or tap on words in bold characters to check the meaning.

At 11:22 p.m. on January 7, 1999, Ms. Jane Webb called the Toronto police to report a suicide. At 11:34 a police car pulled up in front of her house, a small bungalow on a very quiet street, and two policemen got out of the car. Ms. Webb was waiting for them at the door, dressed in a warm coat to protect herself against the cold. She pointed to the house next door, on her right, and accompanied the policemen to the front door of this house.

To the policemen's surprise, the door was partly open. They entered the house and Ms. Webb directed the policemen to the study, which was down the corridor, on the right. The door of the study was also open, and they could see a man's body on the floor near the desk. They realized immediately that he was dead. There was a small round hole in his forehead, just above his right eye, and a gun lay on the floor next to his right hand.

The policemen looked around but did not touch anything. They then left the room and told Ms. Webb to follow them outside. One of the policemen told her that she was a very important witness and asked her to stay in the house until someone came to interview her. He then called the homicide division and gave them the address.

Inspector Coderre and a team of experts arrived fifteen minutes later. The investigation began at once and Inspector Coderre checked every room in the house before he was satisfied.

It was almost 2 a.m. when he finally rang the doorbell at Ms. Webb's home and asked to speak to her. She offered him a cup of coffee which he gratefully accepted. He sat down at the kitchen table and while the coffee was brewing, she told him what had happened.

"I was sitting in this very room, drinking a cup of cocoa like I do every night before I go to bed. Suddenly, the light came on in Mr. James's study and through the window I saw him enter the room and walk over to his desk. Look! You can see the study from here and you can see everything that is happening inside." Inspector Coderre stared out of the kitchen window and realized that she was absolutely right. The study was well lit and he could see his colleagues move around inside as they continued their investigation.

Ms. Webb continued with her story. "I saw Mr. James open a drawer of the desk and take out a gun. I was so shocked I didn't react at first. As I looked, I saw him point the gun at his head and pull the trigger."

She was obviously upset but she continued her account of the terrible event. "As you can imagine, I was in shock, but I realized that I had to do something, although I knew deep down that it was too late." "So what did you do?" asked the inspector. "I ran over to his house and I checked the front door. It was locked. I tried the back door. It too was locked. I went around the house and checked all the windows. They were all locked. So I took a stone and broke a basement window and climbed in. It was stupid under the circumstances, but I didn't want to break any of the big windows."

The inspector was very sympathetic and told her that it was very natural to not want to damage somebody's property. "We noticed the broken window. It was very small. You're lucky you didn't cut yourself as you climbed through it." Ms. Webb nodded in agreement and continued her story. "I was in this very dark basement, but since our houses are very similar I quickly found the light switch. Then I went up the stairs to the main floor. I rushed immediately to the study and I didn't hesitate. I opened the door, switched on the light and ran to the body to see if I could do anything for Mr. James. Of course, as you saw, there was nothing I could do for him. Then I left the house by the front door and came over here to call the police. I left the front door partly open so they could just walk in and see what had happened."

Now that she had finished her story, she began to tremble. "I'm sorry," she explained, "You see, he was more than a good neighbor to me. He was also my boss. I work at his company as his accountant, and I know there was a reason for his despair. The company was going bankrupt, and I feel responsible for his suicide because I was the one who gave him the bad news, just this morning, in fact."

The inspector looked at her but there was little sympathy in his eyes. He got up from his chair and headed towards the front door. As he was picking up his overcoat, he turned to her and said, in a very cold voice, "I think you will have to come down to police headquarters with me. There are a few small details that don't seem to make sense."

Why isn't Inspector Coderre satisfied with Ms. Webb's version of the event?

Back to top If this page is in a new tab or window, close it. If not, click or tap here.

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Explaining common errors in English, based on ESL Blues quizzes. Content is my own.

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This is a detective story for medium-level-English students. You can read it just for fun and try and solve the mystery, but you can also then go on to do the accompanying vocabulary and writing quizzes. Click or tap on words in bold characters to check the meaning. At 11:22 p.m.

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The crime

According to current research, up to forty million people are living as slaves today, and of those, ten million are minors. While some people have been born into slave-like conditions, most are victims of human trafficking, legally known as the crime of Trafficking in Persons, or TIP for short. This illegal trade in human beings is estimated to generate over US$150 billion per year.

Is trafficking in persons the same as smuggling?

The word 'trafficking' might suggest travel. However, the crime can exist even when no transportation of a victim happens. Someone can be a victim of human trafficking in their own country - even in their own street. If they are forced to do things they do not want to do and another person is profiting financially - this is Trafficking in Persons. Human trafficking is a crime based on exploitation and it is often confused with human smuggling. But human smuggling is a different crime based on transportation and requires the illegal crossing of an international or state border.

The victims

Anybody can become a victim of trafficking. However, traffickers usually target people who are desperate and vulnerable. Poverty, unemployment, little or no education, war and natural disasters, such as earthquakes or floods, can all cause extreme vulnerability. Human traffickers also target people who are emotionally vulnerable, especially teenagers and children who feel lonely and unloved and are desperate to feel 'special'.

Methods used to recruit victims

Traffickers use different strategies during the recruitment process, but deception is generally involved. Fake job advertisements, false promises of economic opportunity and a better life are typical lies that traffickers will use to deceive people that a bright, happy future is waiting for them. Also, the 'lover boy' method of recruitment is often used, with promises of true love and a romantic adventure. Sadly, this adventure is likely to be violent exploitation with traumatic consequences. But the traffickers will make a profit from the sale of their victims, and that is their main goal. Despite what films show, traffickers do not usually abduct victims.

Forms of exploitation

Different forms of exploitation include forced labour, especially in the construction industry and mining, fishing and agriculture. Domestic servitude, commercial sexual exploitation, child soldiers, child brides and forced marriage are also forms of human trafficking. We often believe that trafficking is a crime that happens far away, in another country, but think again. The office building we work in or sports stadium we go to may have been built by modern-day slaves. Daily products, such as fruit and vegetables, seafood, clothing, chocolate and the minerals used in electronics, might also include slave labour at some point in the production process.

Ways to take action

Go online to find out the national anti-trafficking hotline number and to discover which anti-trafficking groups are in your local community. Be alert. If you hear about someone, especially a young person, who has been offered employment in another city or country that seems 'too good to be true', help them check that the job really exists. It is strongly advised that you do not try to rescue someone who appears to be a victim. This could endanger yourself and the victim. Instead, call the hotline or police emergency number. Also, think before you shop! As a consumer, find out about the backstory to the products you buy. Try to buy items that are produced ethically so that your money does not support companies that use trafficking victims.

And the good news is ...

Thousands of people around the world, from corporate leaders, academics to artists, are using their skills, resources and passion to fight trafficking. One such organisation is The NO Project, an award-winning, global educational campaign that specifically targets youth awareness of the crime through music, art, dance, film, theatre, poetry, journalism and social media. Around the world, students and educators donate their time and talent to this campaign. As the founder of The NO Project says, 'Youth are the agents of change. Only through a well-informed, pro-active, realistic understanding of this crime can the next generation effectively confront slavery and trafficking.'

Discussion

Language level

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World Day against Trafficking in Persons

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The horrific crime of human trafficking may be closer to you than you realise. Read more about the UN's World Day against Trafficking in Persons.

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Less Television, Less Violence and Aggression - IELTS reading practice test

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Less Television, Less Violence and Aggression reading practice test has 13 questions belongs to the Technology subject. In total 13 questions, 4 questions are TRUE-FALSE-NOT GIVEN form, 7 questions are Matching Information form, 2 questions are Sentence Completion form.

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A tasty dip or spread that's bursting with flavor. Sun-dried tomato spread is perfect for adding to a charcuterie board or an appetizer tray.

Ready in just 5 minutes, this recipe is a perfect last-minute appetizer you can quickly throw together!

Sun-dried tomato pesto

This sun-dried tomato spread or pesto is my new favorite dip. I first made this dip this summer for my nephew's wedding. My husband and I did all the food and planned for 150 people.

It was an outdoor wedding and reception so the challenge was finding food for the grazing table that would hold up to the summer heat.

This tomato spread was perfect because not only was it tasty, but it needed to be served at room temperature (or warmer) and it held up to the hot summer heat!

Some other items I made for the appetizer table were an olive tapenade, garlic hummus, roasted bell pepper hummus, and Boursin cheese spread.

Since the wedding, I have made this tomato spread several times. It's just so good!

Key ingredients

This section reviews the best ingredients and substitutions for this recipe. For an exact list of ingredients and quantities, check the recipe card below.

Sun-Dried Tomatoes - Use oil-packed tomatoes. Some jars contain Italian seasoning and these are fine to use.

Basil - Use fresh basil.

Garlic - Adds so much flavor!

Olive oil - You'll use the oil from the sun-dried tomatoes, but you also need additional oil to make the dip spreadable.

Step-by-step directions

In this section, I share step-by-step photos, cooking methods, techniques, and a general overview. For detailed instructions, temperatures, and timing, check the printable recipe card below.

Place tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, salt and basil together in a food processor

Pulse until just broken down

Add additional olive oil if needed

Serve right away or cover and refrigerate

Recipe tips

If the sun-dried tomatoes are whole or are in large chunks, chop them into smaller pieces before adding them to the food processor.

This recipe is flexible. Add more garlic if you love garlic or less if you don't. Throw in extra basil. Taste and adjust to your liking.

Refrigerating will make the spread very firm and solid. Allow the spread to come to room temperature before serving.

For best results, use within two weeks.

Frequently asked questions

More delicious appetizers

If you make this recipe, I'd love to hear about it! Leave a comment below and snap a picture and tag me on Instagram @beyondthechickencoop

Check out all my delicious appetizers!

Sun-Dried Tomato Spread

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A delicious spread made with sun-dried tomatoes, fresh basil and garlic. Use on a charcuterie board or as an appetizer.

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The MIT factor: celebrating 150 years of maverick genius
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has led the world into the future for 150 years with scientific innovations.
The musician Yo-Yo Ma's cello may not be the obvious starting point for a journey into one of the world's great universities. But, as you quickly realise when you step inside the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, there's precious little going on that you would normally see on a university campus. The cello, resting in a corner of MIT's celebrated media laboratory - a hub of creativity - looks like any other electric classical instrument. But it is much more. Machover, the composer, teacher and inventor responsible for its creation, calls it a 'hyperinstrument', a sort of thinking machine that allows Ma and his cello to interact with one another and make music together. 'The aim is to build an instrument worthy of a great musician like Yo-Yo Ma that can understand what he is trying to do and respond to it,' Machover says. The cello has numerous sensors across its body and by measuring the pressure, speed and angle of the virtuoso's performance it can interpret his mood and engage with it, producing extraordinary new sounds. The virtuoso cellist frequently performs on the instrument as he tours around the world.

Machover's passion for pushing at the boundaries of the existing world to extend and unleash human potential is not a bad description of MIT as a whole. This unusual community brings highly gifted, highly motivated individuals together from a vast range of disciplines, united by a common desire: to leap into the dark and reach for the unknown.

The result of that single unifying ambition is visible all around. For the past 150 years, MIT has been leading the world into the future. The discoveries of its teachers and students have become the common everyday objects that we now all take for granted. The telephone, electromagnets, radars, high-speed photography, office photocopiers, cancer treatments, pocket calculators, computers, the Internet, the decoding of the human genome, lasers, space travel ... the list of innovations that involved essential contributions from MIT and its faculty goes on and on.

From the moment MIT was founded by William Barton Rogers in 1861, it was clear what it was not. While Harvard stuck to the English model of a classical education, with its emphasis on Latin and Greek, MIT looked to the German system of learning based on research and hands-on experimentation. Knowledge was at a premium, but it had to be useful.

This down-to-earth quality is enshrined in the school motto, Mens et manus - Mind and hand - as well as its logo, which shows a gowned scholar standing beside an ironmonger bearing a hammer and anvil. That symbiosis of intellect and craftsmanship still suffuses the institute's classrooms, where students are not so much taught as engaged and inspired.

Take Christopher Merrill, 21, a third-year undergraduate in computer science. He is spending most of his time on a competition set in his robotics class. The contest is to see which student can most effectively program a robot to build a house out of blocks in under ten minutes. Merrill says he could have gone for the easiest route - designing a simple robot that would build the house quickly. But he wanted to try to master an area of robotics that remains unconquered - adaptability, the ability of the robot to rethink its plans as the environment around it changes, as would a human.

'I like to take on things that have never been done before rather than to work in an iterative way just making small steps forward,' he explains.

Merrill is already planning the start-up he wants to set up when he graduates in a year's time. He has an idea for an original version of a contact lens that would augment reality by allowing consumers to see additional visual information. He is fearful that he might be just too late in taking his concept to market, as he has heard that a Silicon Valley firm is already developing something similar. As such, he might become one of many MIT graduates who go on to form companies that fail. Alternatively, he might become one of those who go on to succeed in spectacular fashion. And there are many of them. A survey of living MIT alumni* found that they have formed 25,800 companies, employing more than three million people, including about a quarter of the workforce of Silicon Valley. What MIT delights in is taking brilliant minds from around the world in vastly diverse disciplines and putting them together. You can see that in its sparkling new David Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, which brings scientists, engineers and clinicians under one roof.

Or in its Energy Initiative, which acts as a bridge for MIT's combined work across all its five schools, channelling huge resources into the search for a solution to global warming. It works to improve the efficiency of existing energy sources, including nuclear power. It is also forging ahead with alternative energies from solar to wind and geothermal, and has recently developed the use of viruses to synthesise batteries that could prove crucial in the advancement of electric cars.

In the words of Tim Berners-Lee, the Briton who invented the World Wide Web, 'It's not just another university.

Even though I spend my time with my head buried in the details of web technology, the nice thing is that when I do walk the corridors, I bump into people who are working in other fields with their students that are fascinating, and that keeps me intellectually alive.'
adapted from the Guardian
* people who have left a university or college after completing their studies there

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The MIT factor: celebrating 150 years of maverick genius - IELTS reading practice test

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The MIT factor: celebrating 150 years of maverick genius reading practice test has 13 questions belongs to the Education subject. In total 13 questions, 5 questions are TRUE-FALSE-NOT GIVEN form, 4 questions are Sentence Completion form, 4 questions are Summary, form completion form.

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The history of the tortoise

If you go back far enough, everything lived in the sea. At various points in evolutionary history, enterprising individuals within many different animal groups moved out onto the land, sometimes even to the most parched deserts, taking their own private seawater with them in blood and cellular fluids. In addition to the reptiles, birds, mammals and insects which we see all around us, other groups that have succeeded out of water include scorpions, snails, crustaceans such as woodlice and land crabs, millipedes and centipedes, spiders and various worms. And we mustn't forget the plants, without whose prior invasion of the land none of the other migrations could have happened.

Moving from water to land involved a major redesign of every aspect of life, including breathing and reproduction. Nevertheless, a good number of thoroughgoing land animals later turned around, abandoned their hard-earned terrestrial re-tooling, and returned to the water again. Seals have only gone part way back. They show us what the intermediates might have been like, on the way to extreme cases such as whales and dugongs. Whales (including the small whales we call dolphins) and dugongs, with their close cousins the manatees, ceased to be land creatures altogether and reverted to the full marine habits of their remote ancestors. They don't even come ashore to breed. They do, however, still breathe air, having never developed anything equivalent to the gills of their earlier marine incarnation. Turtles went back to the sea a very long time ago and, like all vertebrate returnees to the water, they breathe air. However, they are, in one respect, less fully given back to the water than whales or dugongs, for turtles still lay their eggs on beaches.

There is evidence that all modem turtles are descended from a terrestrial ancestor which lived before most of the dinosaurs. There are two key fossils called Proganochelys quenstedti and Palaeochersis talampayensis dating from early dinosaur times, which appear to be close to the ancestry of all modem turtles and tortoises. You might wonder how we can tell whether fossil animals lived on land or in water, especially if only fragments are found. Sometimes it's obvious. Ichthyosaurs were reptilian contemporaries of the dinosaurs, with fins and streamlined bodies. The fossils look like dolphins and they surely lived like dolphins, in the water. With turtles it is a little less obvious. One way to tell is by measuring the bones of their forelimbs.

Walter Joyce and Jacques Gauthier, at Yale University, obtained three measurements in these particular bones

of 71 species of living turtles and tortoises. They used a kind of triangular graph paper to plot the three measurements against one another. All the land tortoise species formed a tight cluster of points in the upper part of the triangle; all the water turtles cluster in the lower part of the triangular graph. There was no overlap, except when they added some species that spend time both in water and on land. Sure enough, these amphibious species show up on the triangular graph approximately half way between the 'wet cluster' of sea turtles and the 'dry cluster' of land tortoises. The next step was to determine where the fossils fell. The bones of P quenstedti and JR talampayensis leave us in no doubt. Their points on the graph are right in the thick of the dry cluster. Both these fossils were dry-land tortoises. They come from the era before our turtles returned to the water.

You might think, therefore, that modem land tortoises have probably stayed on land ever since those early terrestrial times, as most mammals did after a few of them went back to the sea. But apparently not. If you draw out the family tree of all modem turtles and tortoises, nearly all the branches are aquatic. Today's land tortoises constitute a single branch, deeply nested among branches consisting of aquatic turtles. This suggests that modem land tortoises have not stayed on land continuously since the time of P. quenstedti and P talampayensis. Rather, their ancestors were among those who went back to the water, and they then re-emerged back onto the land in (relatively) more recent times.

Tortoises therefore represent a remarkable double return. In common with all mammals, reptiles and birds, their remote ancestors were marine fish and before that various more or less worm-like creatures stretching back, still in the sea, to the primeval bacteria. Later ancestors lived on land and stayed there for a very large number of generations. Later ancestors still evolved back into the water and became sea turtles. And finally they returned yet again to the land as tortoises, some of which now live in the driest of deserts.
Complete the flow-chart below.
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The history of the tortoise - IELTS reading practice test

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The history of the tortoise reading practice test has 14 questions belongs to the Leisure & Entertainment subject. In total 14 questions, 3 questions are TRUE-FALSE-NOT GIVEN form, 5 questions are Sentence Completion form, 6 questions are Plan, map, diagram labelling form.

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Created with Hot Potatoes by Half-Baked Software, registered to Klaus Rosmanitz.

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The Cold English Sea - English Tense Exercise

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Interactive tense exercise - Fill in the correct fomr of the verb given !

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7 steps to describe your job descriptions

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Job descriptions are used to centralize tasks and skills. Discover 7 steps for writing your job descriptions.

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Ash tree:

Mathew , who died and this happened after he hanged an old woman because he thought she was a witch .

She fought and shouted “ there will be visitors”

Strange animals seen around the tree , more than four legs...

Then .....he died mysteriously , his body was dead and black , no wounds , no injuries...

Later his grandson was spending a lot of money decorating and rebuilding, he cancelled some graves and the grave of Mrs Mothersole was empty , this was a surprise for everyone

when he opened the room where his grand father died.

He decided to move into the room but he had a visitor , read the bible just like his grandfather , ...

1 cut it down =grandfather

2 you will be looking for me but I will not be here

Next morning he was not there he was outside and dead and black

Everyone said lets cut the tree that was hollow , gardener , was terrified , as he fell down from the ladder , fire started, many spiders run out and people kill them with sticks , the tree burn down. Inside was the body of Mrs Mothersole.