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The World Health Organisation has produced a report predicting that 9.8 billion of us will be living on this planet by 2050. Of that number, 72% will be living in urban areas - a higher proportion than ever before. Presented with this information, governments have a duty to consider how best to meet the (26) _______ of city residents, and not just for the short-term. Certain problems associated with urban living have been highlighted by research company Richmond-Carver in its latest global survey. At the top of the list, survey respondents' concerns is the fact that competition amongst tenants for rental properties has driven the median price up - so much so people need to hold down two or more jobs to meet (27) _______ their expenses. Another issue the survey highlighted is the difficulty commuters face. Overcrowding means that seats are often not available on long journeys, but more significant is that schedules are (28) _______. Many studies have shown the effect that has on a country's productivity. Interestingly, certain problems seem more common in some cities than others: respondents from increasingly crowded European cities, including Manchester and Barcelona, commented on how their quality of life was affected by loud machinery, other people's music and car alarms. Something the survey failed to ask about was the value people placed on having access to nature in urban neighborhoods. (29) _______, some countries are already moving forward. Singapore is a prime example; its rooftop gardens make the city a far more desirable place to live. It is the Singaporean government (30) _______ is behind this push for sustainable living

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Recent studies have shown that more and more students are choosing unhealthy ways to boost energy. The two main ways (1) ____ are eating snacks high in sugar and drinking beverages high in caffeine. In fact, research shows these two choices may (2) ____ in the opposite effects as those desired.  Eating a sweet snack, (3) ____ a candy bar, does not provide the body more energy. (4) ____ candy bars have little (5) ____ value; however, their high sugar content can create a full feeling in the consumer. While the sugar may produce an initial boost in energy, the lack of nutritional value soon (6) ____ the body feeling fatigued. In effect, eating a sweet snack will have the opposite effect to what most people expect.  Likewise, many people will drink a caffeinated beverage like coffee or cola to give themselves more energy. To a certain (7) ____, drinking coffee or cola will give a person some energy. The caffeine can increase the heart rate and blood flow, (8) ____ producing a feeling of increased energy. (9) ____, caffeine products are often consumed in excessive quantities or at unwise times. This, (10) ____, can interfere with normal sleep patterns and also lead to fatigue. In the end, caffeine drinkers often lose valuable hours of sleep and become even more tired during the day

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The philosopher Aristotle said, “In poverty and other misfortunes of life, true friends are a sure refuge. They keep the young out of mischief; they comfort and aid the old in their weakness, and they incite those in the prime of life to noble deeds. “Growing up”, my mother always used to tell me “your friends are a reflection of you”. I did not quite understand this (20) _____ I started meeting individuals who kept, not so healthy friends in their lives and suddenly, as a young teenager, I learned to understand that the friends I keep in my life (21) _____ who I am and desire to be as a person and therefore I have learned to choose my friends wisely over the years. I do not care about the superficial (22) _____ such as looks, money, success or status but rather I emulate those (23) _____ bring laughter, joy, honesty and who can be there for me and also give me a firm kick in the butt when I need it. I always find it intriguing to meet friends of people I know because I can really get a sense of that person by the company they choose to (24) _____ in their life

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Speed reading is not just about reading first. It is also about how much information you can remember when you have finished reading. The World Championship Speed-Reading Competition says that its top competitors average between 1.000 and 2,000 words a minute. But they must remember at least 50 percent of this in order to qualify for the competition. Nowadays, speed reading has become an essential skill in any environment (46) _______ people have to master a large volume of information. Professional workers need reading skills to help them (47) _______ many documents every day, while students under pressure to deal with assignments may feel they have to read more and read faster all the time. (48) _______ there are various methods to increase reading speed, the trick is deciding what information you want first. For example, if you only want a    (49) _______ outline of an issue, then you can skim the material quickly and extract the key facts. However, if you need to understand every detail in a document, then you must read it slowly enough to understand this. Even when you know how to ignore irrelevant detail, there are (50) _______ improvements you can make to your reading style which will increase your speed

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Fathers in today families are spending more time with their children than at any point in the past 100 years. (1) ____ the number of hours the average woman spends at home with her children has declined since the early 1900s, as more and more women enter the workforce, there has been a decrease in the number of children per family and an increase in (2) ____ attention to each child. As a result, mothers today in the United States, (3) ____ those who work part- or full-time, spend almost twice as much time with each child as mothers did in the 1920s. People (4) ____ raised children in the 1940s and 1950s typically report that their own adult children and grandchildren communicate far better with their kids and spend more time (5) ____ with homework than they did. America's children are also safer today than they've (6) ____ been. An infant was four times more likely to die in the 1950s than today. A parent then was 27 per cent more likely to lose an older teen (7) ____ death. If we look back over the last millennium, we can see that families have always been diverse. In each period, families have solved one set of problems only to face new (8) ____. What works for a family in one economic and cultural setting doesn't work for a family in another. What's helpful (9) ____ one stage of a family's life may be (10) ____ at the next stage. If there is one lesson to be (11) ____ from the last millennium of family history, it's that families always have to (12) ____ with a changing world.

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Birds that feed in flocks commonly retire together into roosts. The reasons for roosting communally are not always obvious, but there are some likely benefits. In winter especially, it is important for birds to keep warm at night and conserve precious food reserves. One way to do this is to find a sheltered roost. Solitary roosters shelter in dense vegetation or enter a cavity – horned larks dig holes in the ground and ptarmigan burrow into snow banks - but the effect of sheltering is magnified by several birds huddling together in the roosts, as wrens, swifts, brown creepers, bluebirds, and anis do. Body contact reduces the surface area exposed to the cold air, so the birds keep each other warm. Two kinglets huddling together were found to reduce their heat losses by a quarter, and three together saved a third of their heat. The second possible benefit of communal roosts is that they act as “information centers”. During the day, parties of birds will have spread out to forage over a very large area. When they return in the evening some will have fed well, but others may have found little to eat. Some investigators have observed that when the birds set out again next morning, those birds that did not feed well on the previous day appear to follow those that did. The behavior of common and lesser kestrels may illustrate different feeding behaviors of similar birds with different roosting habits. The common kestrel hunts vertebrate animals in a small, familiar hunting ground, whereas the very similar lesser kestrel feeds on insects over a large area. The common kestrel roosts and hunts alone, but the lesser kestrel roosts and hunts in flocks, possibly so one bird can learn from others where to find insect swarms. Finally, there is safety in numbers at communal roosts since there will always be a few birds awake at any given moment to give the alarm. But this increased protection is partially counteracted by the fact that mass roosts attract predators and are especially vulnerable if they are on the ground. Even those in trees can be attacked by birds of prey. The birds on the edge are at greatest risk since predators find it easier to catch small birds perching at the margins of the roost.
4. The word "communal” in paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to _______ 

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Fathers in today families are spending more time with their children than at any point in the past 100 years. (1) ____ the number of hours the average woman spends at home with her children has declined since the early 1900s, as more and more women enter the workforce, there has been a decrease in the number of children per family and an increase in (2) ____ attention to each child. As a result, mothers today in the United States, (3) ____ those who work part- or full-time, spend almost twice as much time with each child as mothers did in the 1920s. People (4) ____ raised children in the 1940s and 1950s typically report that their own adult children and grandchildren communicate far better with their kids and spend more time (5) ____ with homework than they did. America's children are also safer today than they've (6) ____ been. An infant was four times more likely to die in the 1950s than today. A parent then was 27 per cent more likely to lose an older teen (7) ____ death. If we look back over the last millennium, we can see that families have always been diverse. In each period, families have solved one set of problems only to face new (8) ____. What works for a family in one economic and cultural setting doesn't work for a family in another. What's helpful (9) ____ one stage of a family's life may be (10) ____ at the next stage. If there is one lesson to be (11) ____ from the last millennium of family history, it's that families always have to (12) ____ with a changing world.

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The outbreaks of the African Swine Fever (ASF) were observed in 17 provinces and cities in Vietnam. (33)_____ to the Department of Animal Health's latest report on March 14. The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Nguyen Xuan Cuong held an (34)_____ meeting with heads of 63 provinces and cities on March 14 to discuss preventative measures to prevent the spread of the disease, shortly after receiving the test results (35)_____ confirmed that the pigs are positive for the deadly virus, responsible agencies soon buried diseased pigs and disinfected infected farms with chemicals in the premises of the burying areas. Minister Nguyen Xuan Cuong said outbreaks hit small farms for past time and it may be big losses if the disease is (36)_____ to the South which raises big herd of hog and is the major market for pig products. Minister Cuong stressed that all localities ought to revise and adopt proper measures as per the government's directive No.4/CT–TTG on the synchronous implementation of urgent solutions to control ASE In a related news of ASF, ten drivers were (37)_____ VND 300 million ($12.913) for transporting 350 kilograms of pork but couldn't produce receipt of origin and hygiene certificates, said the Department of Agriculture and Rural Developmen

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Although digital cameras and camera phones have made it easier to capture newsworthy events, it is social media that have revolutionized citizen photography. With news regularly breaking on social networks, some journalists are now turning to them as (26) _______ of images as fast-moving events occur. Unfortunately, (27) _______ reporters have published user-generated content (UGC) without permission. Despite official guide (28) _______ images posted on social media can be used without permission if there are exceptional circumstances or strong public interest, debate continues about whether this is (29) _______. With research indicating that around one in ten people would film or photograph a news event, it is clear that UGC has a major role to play in the future of the media. (30) _______, if the media is to prevent its relationship with the public from souring, steps must be taken to ensure that people are properly rewarded for their work and that permission is always sought

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British people have a reputation for being rather quiet and reserved. However, a new study has (1) ____ that Britons are actually quite sociable and the (2) ____ person claims to have 14 close friends. Although a minority of those questioned (3) ____ that they had no best friend, a quarter said that they had more than 18 close friends. Experts said that this is (4) ____ to changes in the way people (5) ____ their free time. They are now more (6) ____ to invite friends to their homes or go out socialising than previous generations. The increasing use of mobile phones and emails has also made it easier to (7) ____ a greater number of friendships.  Men's relationships are not (8) ____ though they tend to have more friends. Women, (9) ____ prefer to have a small number of friends they can trust (10) ____, and with whom they can feel completely at (11) ____. The idea that people in the north of England are more neighbourly than those in the south seems to be backed (12) ____ by the survey. However, despite having friends, it seems that family still (13) ____ an important part in most people's lives. When asked who they would (14) ____ to for help if they were ill or had a problem, the majority said that they would (15) ____ upon a relative first rather than a friend

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Culture has a strong influence on non–verbal communication. Even the simple act of looking someone in the eye is not at all that simple. In the USA, Americans are (5) _____ to look directly at people when speaking to them. It shows interest in what they are saying and is thought to carry a (6) _____ of honesty. Meanwhile, in Japan and Korea, people avoid long periods of eye contact. It is considered more polite to look to the side during a conversation. The Lebanese, (7) _____, stand close together and look intensely into each other's eyes. The action shows sincerity and gives people a better sense of what their counterparts want. Given such differences with even the most common expressions, people (8) _____ travel or work abroad have a real need to learn the other culture's body language. People tend to be unaware of the messages they are sending to others. So, it is (9) _____ to consider your own body language before dealing with people from other cultures. Knowing about the body language of friends, clients, and colleagues can be very helpful in improving understanding and avoiding miscommunication

Read the reading below carefully, and then complete it with the best option A, B, C or D given below:
Easter is an important Christian festival and holiday. It is (1)______to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Easter is not a fixed holiday. Its (2)____varies between 22nd March and 25th April. People celebrate Easter (3)____ the world. In the UK, Easter is a public holiday. People (4)_ Easter chocolate eggs to their friends and family. There are also egg hunts for kids. In the US, Easter is a (5)______ holiday. People can go to church and have a special family meal. They also (6)____ egg-hunts and give gifts of coloured eggs. In Russia, Easter is one of the (7)___important holidays. People celebrate it (8)___ an Easter breakfast or meal. They also create very beautiful Easter eggs

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Edward Patrick Eagan was born on April 26th 1897 in Denver, Colorado, and his father died in a railroad accident when Eagan was only one year old. He and his four brothers were raised by his mother, who earned a small income from teaching foreign languages. Inspired by Frank Marriwell, the hero of a series of popular novels for boys, Eagan pursued an education for himself and an interest in boxing. He attended the University of Denver for a year before serving in the U.S. army as an artillery lieutenant during World War I. After the war, he entered Yale University and while studying there, won the US national amateur heavyweight boxing title. He graduated from Yale in 1921, attended Harvard Law School, and received a Rhodes scholarship to the University of Oxford where he received his A.M. in 1928. While studying at Oxford, Eagan became the first American to win the British amateur boxing championship. Eagan won his first gold medal as a light heavyweight boxer at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp, Belgium. Eagan also fought at the 1924 Olympics in Paris as a heavyweight but failed to get a medal. Though he had taken up the sport just three weeks before the competition, he managed to win a second gold medal as a member of four-man bobsled team at the 1932 Olympics in Lake Placid, New York. Thus, he became the only athlete to win gold medals at both the Summer and Winter Olympics.
2. According to the passage, who was Frank Merriwell?

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There are many types of family systems around the world. In North America and northern Europe, the nuclear family (with two generations - a father, a mother and one or more children) is often seen as the most typical. In contrast, in most other parts of the world, extended families, which include other family members such as grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins, are seen as the norm.  The common view is that the nuclear family has become the norm in many Western societies as a result of industrialization and urbanization. This trend began in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, when people were forced to move to cities to find work in the factories that sprang up during the Industrial Revolution. In the twentieth century, greater industrialization resulted in even more people leaving their large extended families. Urbanization also meant that people lived in much smaller houses, which were not big enough for an extended family.  The trend towards nuclear families meant that many of the duties and responsibilities of a family, such as providing food and shelter, cleaning the home, preparing the food, caring for children and their education, and caring for the sick and elderly are no longer shared among the members of the extended family. The parents (or parent) now have to do this, with some help from the state. However, this is the price that people pay for the higher standard of living that may come from living in a city.  We may think we know what we mean by a ‘nuclear' family and an extended family, but reality is more complicated than most people believe. Most nuclear families are part of extended families: children have grandparents and, in many cases, aunts, uncles and cousins as well. Part of what makes them ‘nuclear' is that they live in their own separate household, but it is not the whole story. In Greece or Italy, for example, a nuclear family may live in its own flat, but the extended family may live in the same apartment block or in the same street and family members see each other and even eat together every day.  There is at least one more factor to consider. Family members may be separated from each other by geographical distance, but they may have close emotional ties. Even in North America and northern Europe, grandparents usually have close bonds with their grandchildren, and families often travel long distances so that they can see each other. Grandparents often help their adult children, for example, by cooking and looking after their children in emergencies. In the same way, when their parents become too old to live on their own, adult children may take them into their own homes. As a result, they turn their nuclear family into an extended family.  The structure of families changes over time. The effects of urbanization and industrialization are enormous, but they are not the only reasons for the changes. People marry, have children, become widowed, divorce and die. Children grow up and adults grow old. Nuclear families become extended families and extended families become nuclear families. Family ties stay strong or become weak. One thing is certain: in a changing world, the family will continue to change, but ultimately, it is likely to continue to be the basic unit of society.  
9. Which of the following is NOT stated in the passage?

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Forget global terrorism - for most of the world's population, ticking time bombs like earthquakes, supervolcanoes and hurricanes pose a far greater threat. Natural disaster expert Bill McGuire reveals a few of the top catastrophes waiting to happen. With NASA's eminent climate scientist, Jim Hansen, concerned that collapsing polar ice sheets could result in sea levels rising 1-2m this century and several more in the next, prospects for the Earth's coastal zones are bleak. A 1m rise would threaten one third of the world's agricultural land, while a 4m rise would maroon Miami 60km offshore. Rising sea levels is not the only threat to coastal regions. The Cumbre Vieja volcano on the Canary Island of La Palma is slowly creeping seawards. During a future eruption, this gigantic landslide will plunge into the ocean, pushing up a bulge of water close to a kilometre high, spawning a mega-tsunami capable of devastating all the coastal areas surrounding the North Atlantic. Coastal regions also face the menace of desertification. By 2030, over half a billion people living around the shores of the Mediterranean will be viewing the encroaching desert with increasing panic. An area bigger than the UK, and home to 16 million people, is threatened - by the end of the century- with transformation from a green and pleasant land to a baking wilderness of sand and rock. However, these disasters seem pale in comparison to the mega-catastrophes waiting to happen like supervolcanoes, for instance. Every 50 millennia or so, a colossal volcanic blast expels sufficient ash and gas to cover a continent and block the Sun's rays for years on end, heralding a bitter volcanic winter. At Yellowstone in Wyoming, US, two such super-eruptions have shattered the crust in the last 2.1 million years and the volcano there remains restless. An asteroid attack is another threat which would have devastating consequences. A total of 713 asteroids with diameters of 1km or more, and the potential to clobber the Earth at some future date, have been identified. A 2km asteroid would load the atmosphere with dust and trigger a sustained global freeze. Harvests would fail and billions would die. Fortunately, such collisions only happen every couple of million years.
2. According to Jim Hansen, what is an outcome of polar ice caps melting?

Read the reading below carefully, and then complete it with the best option A, B, C or D given below:
Approximately 350 million people speak English as their first ___(1)___ . About the same number use it __(2)___ a second language. It is the language ___(3)___ aviation, international sport and world trade. 75% of the world's mail is in English, 60% of the world's radio stations broadcast in English, and more than half of the world's newspapers are ___(4)___ in English. It is an official language in 44 countries. In ___(5)___ others, it is the language of business, commerce and technology. There are many varieties of English, but Scottish, Australian, Indian and Jamaican speakers of English, in spite of the differences in pronunciation, structure and vocabulary, would recognize that they are all speaking the same basic language

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The Industrial Revolution in Britain was built on the use of machines in factories. Since the 1950s, Britain's (24)......industries have replaced machine operators with computers, and this (25)......has led to a decline in the number of (26).......in many factories. Goods are bought and used much more than ever before but a lot of these goods are imported. By the beginning of the 20th century, other. industrial countries like the USA were (27).......with Britain's exports, and countries in the Far East have been able to provide cheaper (28)......since the 1970s. Areas located with heavy industries are suffering high unemployment. During the last 30 years, there has been a constant rise in smaller industries (29).........as "light industries". These ones use electricity and are not (30) .........on raw materials such as coal so they are "footloose", i.e. they can be located anywhere. They produce such things as washing machines or spare (31) .......... Some of these industries produce nothing at all, but provide services like distribution. The consumer boom of the 1980s and the increased leisure time of most Britons have led to rapid (32) ........ in service industries like banking, tourism, retailing and information processing, and in industries which distribute, maintain, and repair (33)............consumer goods

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Edward Patrick Eagan was born on April 26th 1897 in Denver, Colorado, and his father died in a railroad accident when Eagan was only one year old. He and his four brothers were raised by his mother, who earned a small income from teaching foreign languages. Inspired by Frank Marriwell, the hero of a series of popular novels for boys, Eagan pursued an education for himself and an interest in boxing. He attended the University of Denver for a year before serving in the U.S. army as an artillery lieutenant during World War I. After the war, he entered Yale University and while studying there, won the US national amateur heavyweight boxing title. He graduated from Yale in 1921, attended Harvard Law School, and received a Rhodes scholarship to the University of Oxford where he received his A.M. in 1928. While studying at Oxford, Eagan became the first American to win the British amateur boxing championship. Eagan won his first gold medal as a light heavyweight boxer at the 1920 Olympic Games in Antwerp, Belgium. Eagan also fought at the 1924 Olympics in Paris as a heavyweight but failed to get a medal. Though he had taken up the sport just three weeks before the competition, he managed to win a second gold medal as a member of four-man bobsled team at the 1932 Olympics in Lake Placid, New York. Thus, he became the only athlete to win gold medals at both the Summer and Winter Olympics.
1. What is the main idea of the passage?

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In Germany, it's important to be serious in a work situation. They don't mix work and play so you shouldn't make jokes (1)_______you do in the UK and USA when you first meet people. They work in a very organized way and prefer to do one thing at a time. They don't like· interruptions or (2)_______changes of schedule. Punctuality is very important so you should arrive on time for appointments. At meeting, it's important to follow the agenda and not interrupt (3)_______speaker. If you give a presentation, you should focus (4)_______facts and technical information and the quality of your company's products. You should also prepare well, as they may ask a lot of questions. Colleagues normally use the family names, and title - for example 'Doctor' or 'Professor', so you shouldn't use first names (5)_______a person asks you to

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Stella McCartney was born in 1972, the daughter of pop star Sir Paul McCartney. She is the youngest of three sisters. One sister is a potter and the other sister does the same job as their mother used to do - she works as a photographer. Stella's brother, James, is a musician. Stella first hit the newspaper headlines in 1995 when she graduated in fashion design from art college. At her final show, her clothes were modeled by her friends, Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss, both well-known models. Unsurprisingly, the student show became front-page news around the world. Stella hadn't been in the news before as a fashion designer but she had spent time working in the fashion world since she was fifteen. In March 1997, Stella went to work for the fashion house Chloe. People said the famous fashion house had given her the job because of her surname and her famous parents but Stella soon showed how good she was. She designs clothes which she would like to wear herself, although she's not a model, and many famous models and actors choose to wear them. In 2001 Stella started her own fashion house and has since opened stores around the world and won many prizes. A lifelong vegetarian, McCartney does not use any leather or fur in her design. Instead, she uses silk, wool and other animal-derived fabrics.
3. Which of the following is TRUE about the show?

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Planet earth is part of a system of planets and their moons, as well as numerous asteroids and comets which (26)_________around a huge star we call the Sun. The Sun itself (27)_________of gas. Nuclear reactions inside its core (28)_______the heat and light that make life on the Earth (29)________. The Earth is the third of four small terrestrial (Earth like) planets that orbit close to the (30)_________. Further out in our Solar System are four huge gas planets, while distant Pluto, (31)_________planet, is made (32)_________rock and ice. Our Earth is one of the ten planets that orbit the Sun- a huge, burning-hot star in the center of our Solar System. The Solar System and all the stars in the (33)_________are part of our galaxy-the Milky Way, which (34)________as many as 200 billions stars. Beyond our galaxy (35)_________millions more galaxies. They all add together to make up the Universe