Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word or phrase that best fits each of the numbered blanks.
A healthy way to know a city Maybe you are staying in a city, and there is no park nearby where you can take your morning job. One of the more recent trend is to go on a running tour, but you are not leading the way. Rather, a running enthusiast (1).......   knows the best (2)..... in the city acts as your guide. You are going out for a run, but you are also being shown highlights of the city while you are doing it.
Guided running tours are a trend that seems to be catching (3)...... in quite a few of the bigger cities in the United States. New York City, Chicago, and San Francisco are just three of the major cities that  have  running  tours in (4)........... They offer these tours to individuals, groups, and even for corporate events. If you are going into a city with colleagues to attend a business meeting or a convention, what better way is there to see the city and network with others (5) .......while taking a healthy run? 
(1).......................................
 

There are many theories about the beginning of drama in ancient Greek. The one most widely accepted today is based on the assumption that drama evolved from ritual. The argument for this view goes as follows. In the beginning human beings viewed the natural forces of the world, even the seasonal changes, as unpredictable, and they sought, through various means, to control these unknown and feared powers. Those measures which appeared to bring the desired results were then retained and repeated until they hardened into fixed rituals. Eventually stories arose which explained or veiled the mysteries of the rites. As time passed some rituals were abandoned, but the stories, later called myths, persisted and provided material for art and drama.
Those who believed that drama evolved out of ritual also argue that those rites contained the seed of theatre because music, dance, masks, and costumes were almost always used. Furthermore, a suitable site had to be provided for performances, and when the entire community did not participate, a clear division was usually made between the “acting area” and “auditorium”. In addition, there were performers, and since considerable importance was attached to avoiding mistakes in the enactment of rites. Religious leaders usually assumed that task. Wearing masks and costumes, they often impersonated other people, animals, or supernatural beings, and mimed the desired effect- success in hunt or battle, the coming rain, the revival of the Sun-as an actor might. Eventually such dramatic representations were separated from religious activities.
Another theory traces the theatre’s origin from the human interest in storytelling. According to this view, tales (about the hunt, war, or other feats) are gradually elaborated, at first through the use of impersonation, action, and dialogue by a narrator and then through the assumption of each of the roles by a different person. A closely related theory traces theatre to those dances that are primarily rhythmical and gymnastic or that are imitations of animal movements and sound.

According to the passage, what is the main difference between ritual and drama?

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
The nuclear family, consisting of a mother, father, and their children, may be more an American ideal than an American reality. Of course, the so-called traditional American family was always more varied than we had been led to believe, reflecting the very different racial, ethnic, class, and religious customs among different American groups.
The most recent government statistics reveal that only about one third of all current American families  fit the traditional mold and another third consists of married couples who either have no children or have none still living at home. Of the final one third, about 20 percent of the total number of American households are single people, usually women over sixty-five years of age. A small percentage, about 3 percent of the total, consists of unmarried people who choose to live together; and the rest, about 7 percent are single, usually divorced parents, with at least one child.
Today, these varied family types are typical, and therefore, normal. Apparently, many Americans are achieving supportive relationships in family forms other than the traditional one.

Unmarried people living together represent     .

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word or phrase that best fits each of the numbered blanks.
Nearly 200 of the 1500 native plant species in Hawaii are at risk of going extinct in the near future because they have been (1)........  to such low numbers. Approximately 90 percent of Hawaii's plants are   found nowhere else in the world but they are (2)........ by alien invasive species such as feral goats, pigs, rodents and non-native plants.
The Hawaii Rare Plant Restoration Group is striving to (3)........ the extinction of the 182 rare  Hawaiian plants with fewer than 50 individuals remaining in the wild. Since 1990, (4).......  a result of     their "Plant Extinction Prevention Program", sixteen species have been brought into cultivation and three species have been reintroduced. Invasive weeds have been removed in key areas and fencing put up in order to protect plants in the wild.
In the future, the Hawaii Rare Plant Restoration Program aims at collecting genetic material from the remaining plants in the wild for storage as a safety net for the future. They also aim to manage wild populations and where possible reintroduce species into (5 )........ .
(3)................................

Choose the best answer: 
We are all slowly (1) __________  the earth. The seas and rivers are too dirty to swim in.
There is so much smoke in the air that it is unhealthy to live in many of the world’s cities. In one well-
known city, for example, poisonous gases (2) __________ cars pollute the air so much that traffic
policemen have to wear oxygen masks. We have cut down (3) __________ trees that there are now
vast areas of wasteland all over the world. As a result, farmers in parts of Africa cannot grow enough
(4) __________. In certain countries in Asia, there is too little rice. Moreover, we do not take care of
the countryside.
Wild animals are quickly disappearing. For instance, tigers are rare in India now because we
have killed too many of them. However, it isn’t enough simply to talk about the problem. We must act
now before it is too late to do (5) __________ about it. Join us now. Save the Earth!
4.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
For many American university students, the weeklong spring break holiday means on endless party on a sunny beach in Florida or Mexico. In Panama City Beach in Florida, a city with permanent population of around 36.000, more than half a million university students arrive during the month of March to play and party, making it the number one spring break destination in the United States
A weeklong drinking binge is not for everyone, however and a growing number of American university students have found a way to make spring break matter. For them, joining or leading a group of volunteers to travel locally or internationally and work to alleviate problems such as poverty, homelessness, or environmental damage makes spring break a unique learning experience that university students can feel good about.
During one spring break students at James Madison University in Virginia participated in 15 alternative spring break" trips to nearby states, three others to more distant parts of the United States and five international trips. One group of JMU students travelled to Bogalusa, Louisiana to help rebuild homes damaged by Hurricane Katrina. Another group traveled to Mississippi to organize creative activities for children living in homeless shelter. One group of students did go to exhausting physical labor such Florida. but not to lie on the sand. They performed as maintaining hiker rails and destroying invasive plant species that threaten the native Florida ecosystem.
Students who participate in alternative spring break projects find them very rewarding. While most university students have to get their degrees before they can start helping people, students volunteers are able to help people now. On the other hand, the accommodations are far from glamorous. Students often sleep on the floor of a school or church, or spend the week camping in tents. But students only pay around
$250 for meals and transportation, which is much less than some their peers spend to travel to more traditional spring break hotspots
Alternative spring break trips appear to be growing in popularity at universities across the United States. Students cite a number of reasons for participating. Some appreciate the opportunity to socialize and meet new friends. Others want to exercise their beliefs about peoples obligation to serve humanity and make the world a better place. Whatever their reasons, these students have discovered something that gives them rich rewards along with a break from school work.

The article implies that university students      

Choose the word which is stresses differently from the rest: insecticide, fertilizer, pesticide, herbicide

Are organically grown foods the best food choices? The advantages claimed for such foods over conventionally grown and marketed food products are now being debated. Advocates of organic foods - a term whose meaning varies greatly - frequently proclaim that such products are safer and more nutritious than others.
The growing interest of consumers in the safety and nutritional quality of the typical North American diet is a welcome development. However, much of this interest has been sparked by sweeping claims that the food supply is unsafe or inadequate in meeting nutritional needs.
Although most of these claims are not supported by scientific evidence, the preponderance of written material advancing such claims makes it difficult for the general public to separate fact from fiction. As a result, claims that eating a diet consisting entirely of organically grown foods prevents or cures disease or provides other benefits to health have become widely publicized and form the basis for folklore.
Almost daily the public is besieged by claims for “no-aging” diets, new vitamins, and other wonder foods. There are numerous unsubstantiated reports that natural vitamins are superior to synthetic ones, that fertilized eggs are nutritionally superior to unfertilized eggs, that untreated grains are better than fumigated grains, and the like.
One thing that most organically grown food products seem to have in common is that they cost more than conventionally grown foods. But in many cases consumers are misled if they believe organic foods can maintain health and provide better nutritional quality than conventionally grown foods. So there is real cause for concern if consumers, particularly those with limited incomes, distrust the regular food supply and buy only expensive organic foods instead.

The word “maintain” has closest meaning with ............

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
“ Calcite- containing dust particles blow into the air and combine with nitric acid in polluted air from factories to form an entirely new particle – calcium nitrate , ” said Alexander Laskin, a senior research scientist at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, Washington .These nitrates have optical and chemical properties that are completely different from those of the originally dry dust particles . Due to this, climate models need to be updated to reflect this chemistry. Calcite dust is common in arid areas such as Israel, where scientists collected particles for analysis.
Working from a mountaintop, the team collected dust that had blown in from the northern shores of Egypt, Sinai,and southern Israel. The particles had combined with air containing pollutants that came from Cairo.They analyzed nearly 2,00 individual particles and observed the physical and chemical changes at the W.R Wiley Environmental Sciences Laboratory.
A key change in the properties of the newly formed nitrate particles is that they begin to absorb water and retain the moisture .These wet particles can scatter and absorb sunlight-presenting climate modelers, who need to know where the energy is going , a new wild card to deal with . Companion studies of dust samples from the Sahara and the Saudi coast and loess from China show that the higher the calcium in the mineral , the more reactive they are in with nitric acid .And once the particle is changed , it stays that way.
“When dust storms kick up these particles and they enter polluted areas , the particles change ,” Laskin said . “To what extent this is happening globally, as more of the world becomes industrialized , we don’t know . But now we have the laboratory and field evidence that shows it is definitely happening . The story is much more complicated than anybody thought .”

The word “those ” in paragraph 1 refers to     .

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
Some people think that a spider is an insect, but it is an arachnid. Arachnids have two main body parts and eight walking legs while insects have three main body parts and six legs. Many insects can fly, but spiders cannot fly.
There are many different kinds of spiders around the world. They come in different colors, such as black, brown, white, yellow, and orange. Spiders usually live for one year but a spider called the Tarantula lives as long as 20 years. Some spiders are very small but some are so large they can fit a dinner plate.
The most unusual thing is that a spider can spin a web. Spiders have silk in their stomach and they use the silk to make a web. The web is the spider's home. But the spider does not stick to its own web because its legs have oil them. It is very strong and sticky. The web is used to catch insects. When an insect is trapped on a spider's web, the spider wraps the insect in silk. It eats the insect at a later time. However, the spider does not really eat it. Since it has no teeth, it puts venom in the insect to make it a liquid.

The word “it” in paragraph 3 refers to     .

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
George Washington Carver showed that plant life was more than just food for animals and humans. Carver’s first step was to analyze plant parts to find out what they were made of. He then combined these simpler isolated substances with other substances to create new products.
The branch of chemistry that studies and finds ways to use raw materials from farm products to make industrial products is called chemurgy. Carver was one of the first and greatest chemurgists of all time. Today the science of chemurgy is better known as the science of synthetics. Each day people depend on and use synthetic materials made from raw materials. All his life Carver battled against the disposal of waste materials and warned of the growing need to develop substitutes for the natural substances being used up by humans.
Carver never cared about getting credit for the new products he created. He never tried to patent his discoveries or get wealthy from them. He turned down many offers to leave Tuskegee Institute to become a rich scientist in private industry. Thomas Edison, inventor of the electric light, offered him a laboratory in Detroit to carry out food research. When the United States government made him a collaborator in the Mycology and Plant Disease Survey of the Department of Agriculture, he accepted the position with the understanding that he wouldn’t have to leave Tuskegee. As an authority on plant diseases – especially of the fungus variety – Carver sent hundreds of specimens to the United States Department of Agriculture. At the peak of his career, Carver’s fame and influence were known on every continent.

The phrase “getting credit” in paragraph 3 can be best replaced with

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
“They told me I could never walk again. But when I listened to music, I forgot all about the pain. I found the strength I didn’t know I had.”Ninety-two-year-old Tina Goodman, who regained her ability to walk, thanks to music.
This is just one of the many stories in Fettaro’s book “The Healing Power of Music” . Fettaro tries to show just how important music is in our lives and how it can help us to be healthy and happy.
According to Fettaro, music can make sick people again. In fact, his book comes with a CD of recordings, each one specially designed to help with a number of health problems.
Fettaro, e well-known music therapist, promises that by reading his book, you will be able to develop the healing power of music in your life. He says this will help you fight headaches and back pain, as well as reduce stress, high blood pressure, and many other common illnesses.
Certainly, I accept that listening to certain types of music can help with particular problems, such as stress. I am also comfortable with Fettaro’s claim that by reading his book, you’ll be able to create a peaceful enviroment to help you relax in your home. I found the relaxation and breathing techniques very useful. Similarly his claim that music help you sleep better seems reasonable. Yet when he goes on to promise his music therapies will help cure depression and even cancer, he begins to sound a little bit unbelievable.
Nevertheless, for those of you who are interested in the power of music to heal, this is a great book to buy. It’s a thorough introduction to the history and practice of music therapy. Fettaro writes in a simple, easy to understand way and shows clearly how music can affect us positively. His basic message-that music can improve our lives-is well-presented and clear. It may even be true that certain techniques covered here can help some people recover from unpleasant health problems. However, his promises of “amazing results” seem impossible to justify.

What is the basic message of Fettaro’s book?

Interest is the sum charged for borrowing money for a fixed period of time. Principal is the term used for the money that is borrowed, and the rate of interest is the percent per year of the principal charged for its use. Most of the profits for a bank are derived from the interest that they charge for the use of their own or their depositor’s money.
All problems in interest may be solved by using one general equation that may be stated as follows:
Interest = Principal X Rate X Time
Any one of the four quantities – that is, interest, principal, rate, or time – may be found when the other three are known. The time is expressed in years. The rate is expressed as a decimal fraction. Thus, 6 percent interest means six cents charged for the use of $1 of principal borrowed for one year. Although the time may be less than, equal to, or greater than one year, most applications for loans are for periods of less than one year. For purpose of computing interest for short periods, the commercial year or 360 days is commonly used, but when large sums of money are involved, exact interest is computed on the basis of 365 days.

Which of the following would be a correct expression of an interest rate as stated in the equation for computing interest?

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
The problem of cardiac arrest has become a major problem these days. A lot of patients have acute pain after suffering from a stroke. There are plenty of medicines, surgical methods developed in the field of medicine to treat such cardiac problems. These solutions are time consuming and costly. In the process of rehabilitation, the medicines also have a lot of side effects on the human body and take time to give relief. Therefore, a lot of people go for alternative therapies that help in rehabilitation of patients who suffer from cardiac stroke. The alternative therapies help in relieving pain, stress and make the body healthy and fit through exercise, yoga as well as meditation.
Those who have the cardiac complaint have to take a good care of their diet.
Also, they must look after their regular exercise in order to stay fit and make sure that they do not take undue stress. These are some of the precautions that you need to take while you are in the process of rehabilitation. The cardiac rehabilitation can be carried out at the rehabilitation centers as well as at the residence of the patients. Once the patient learns all the exercise and techniques of meditation and understands what diet he or she should include in their meals as the instructions of the doctor’s and dieticians, then it is possible to accomplish the rehabilitation process at home with little guidance and monitoring. But the best results are seen at the center, where the program is given to a group of patients together.
The alternative therapies used for cardiac rehabilitation are stress management, physical exercises and diet. Stress management is very much essential in the rehabilitation process because it has a lot of effects on the patient’s body. A lot of relaxation techniques are taught to the patients that helps them in stress management, among them meditation is one of the main focuses.
The various rehabilitation programs also give you information on how to have a stress free lifestyle. The patients are supported and encouraged to discuss their problems with the counselor or fellow patients. This helps them to vent their feelings and feel comforted. Breathing exercises are also of great help for the patients who are undergoing cardiac rehabilitation.
In addition to stress management, physical exercises are also given a lot of importance in the rehabilitation program. The patients are asked to perform various forms of physical exercise which are suitable to them depending on their age and the severity of their problems. These activities include activities like walking, jogging, cycling, and some other sports like badminton, tennis etc., to maintain their health and keep their muscles, bones, and body tissues in a good state. Cardio exercise in a gymnasium is also encouraged. This helps in strengthening the muscles and managing weight.
The diet of these patients also needs to be looked upon very carefully. Such people should stay away from alcohol and tobacco consumption in order to improve their health. Make sure that their meals include plenty of organic foodstuffs as well as fruits and juices. Do not include junk and oily foodstuffs in your diet because they are very difficult to digest. The intake of calories should also be done at required level. It is a significant fact that the patients have to understand and work accordingly.

Which is one of the main areas focused in the stress management program?

Are organically grown foods the best food choices? The advantages claimed for such foods over conventionally grown and marketed food products are now being debated. Advocates of organic foods - a term whose meaning varies greatly - frequently proclaim that such products are safer and more nutritious than others.
The growing interest of consumers in the safety and nutritional quality of the typical North American diet is a welcome development. However, much of this interest has been sparked by sweeping claims that the food supply is unsafe or inadequate in meeting nutritional needs.
Although most of these claims are not supported by scientific evidence, the preponderance of written material advancing such claims makes it difficult for the general public to separate fact from fiction. As a result, claims that eating a diet consisting entirely of organically grown foods prevents or cures disease or provides other benefits to health have become widely publicized and form the basis for folklore.
Almost daily the public is besieged by claims for “no-aging” diets, new vitamins, and other wonder foods. There are numerous unsubstantiated reports that natural vitamins are superior to synthetic ones, that fertilized eggs are nutritionally superior to unfertilized eggs, that untreated grains are better than fumigated grains, and the like.
One thing that most organically grown food products seem to have in common is that they cost more than conventionally grown foods. But in many cases consumers are misled if they believe organic foods can maintain health and provide better nutritional quality than conventionally grown foods. So there is real cause for concern if consumers, particularly those with limited incomes, distrust the regular food supply and buy only expensive organic foods instead.

The word “those” stands for     _?

The attraction of gold is as old as history. Since ancient times, gold has been the object of dreams and obsessions. Western literature is full of characters who kill for gold or hoard it, from King Midas in the ancient Greek myths, to Fagin in Dickens' Oliver Twist. These characters go to evil extremes to get or keep their gold and they get the punishment they deserve. Most people would not be willing to go to such extremes, of course, but they would not question the assumption that gold has lasting value above and beyond any local currency. Societies change over time, customs and currencies evolve, but gold remains. A wedding ring, for example, must be gold, and so should any serious gift of jewelry. In fact, giving and wearing gold is still a mark of prestige in our post-industrial society, though gold is no longer valued as it used to be thousands of years ago.
Why is gold so valuable? True, it is shiny, durable, and rare, but it is far less useful than many other minerals or metals. It is also not like stock in a company, where the value of the stock depends on the performance of the company. Gold, on the contrary, like any currency, is valuable precisely because people believe it is valuable. That is, if people were willing to accept seashells for their labor and could use them to pay for food, fuel, and other commodities, then seashells would become a valuable currency. Thus, the value of gold depends on the collective belief that gold will continue to be valuable. As long as demand for gold remains steady, the price will hold steady; if demand is high, it will continue to increase in value. But if people should someday lose faith in gold, the price of gold could fall sharply.
Another factor that has affected the price of gold has been the increasing difficulty in acquiring it. Today, most of the gold left in the grounds is in microscopic pieces mixed with rock. To get it, miners must dig up tons and tons of rock, and then spray it with chemicals to separate out the gold. For one ounce of gold - a wedding ring, for example - the mine processes about 30 tons of rock. This is already a costly operation. But there are also hidden social and environmental costs. The mining and processing of gold is ruinous to the environment and to the health of people living nearby. Most of these mines are in poor regions where the people have had little voice in whether there should be mines and how the mines should be run. The large multinational mining companies simply bought the land and opened the mines. However, as people and governments begin to realize the extent of the damage caused by the mines, the situation might change.
Indeed, if the mining companies ever have to pay the full environmental and social costs of mining gold, the price of gold is likely to climb yet higher.

Which of the following is NOT true about gold?

Choose the word or phrase among A, B, C or D that best fits the blank space in the following passage:

"Before the 1960s, Singapore was essential a trading nation. Since (1)….. , it has developed a more (2)…. economy and has become an important financial, trade, and transportation center. Singapore has (3)….. banks, insurance, and finance companies, as (4) …..  as a stock exchange. Tourism is also important to the (5)…. of Singapore.
 There is (6)…. unemployment in Singapore. The country’s annual income per capita (per person) is one of the (7) …. in Asia. The government of Singapore plays a major role in the country’s economy. For example, it (8)….. what benefits, such as vacation time and sick leave, must be (9)….for workers by employers. It also operates an employment agency to help people find jobs, and it provides (10)…..  for retired workers."

1. Before the 1960s, Singapore was essential a trading nation. Since (1)….. , it has developed 

It was the first photograph that I had ever seen, and it fascinated me. I can remember holding it at every angle in order to catch the flickering light from the oil lamp on the dresser. The man in the photograph was unsmiling, but his eyes were kind. I had never met him, but I felt that I knew him. One evening when I was looking at the photograph, as I always did before I went to sleep, I noticed a shadow across the man’s thin face. I moved the photograph so that the shadow lay perfectly around his hollow cheecks. How different he looked!
That night I could not sleep, thinking about the letter that I would write. First, I would tell him that I was eleven years old, and that if he had a little girl my age, she could write to me instead of him. I knew that he was a very busy man. Then I would explain to him the real purpose of my letter. I would tell him how wonderful he looked with the shadow that I had seen across his photograph, and I would most carefully suggest that he grow whiskers.
Four months later when I met him at the train station near my home in Westfield, New York, he was wearing a full beard. He was so much taller than I had imagined from my tiny photograph.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “I have no speech to make and no time to make it in. I appear before you that I may see you and that you may see me.” Then he picked me right up and kissed me on both cheeks. The whiskers scratched. “Do you think I look better, my little friend?” he asked me.
My name is Grace Bedell, and the man in the photograph was Abraham Lincoln.

The little girl could not sleep because she was ...............

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
Perhaps better known than the Cullinan Diamond is the Hope Diamond, a valuable and blue gem with a background of more than 300 years as a world traveler.The 112-carat blue stone later became the Hope Diamond was mined in India sometime before the middle of the seventeenth century and was first known to be owned by Shah Jahan, who built the Taj Mahal in memory of his beloved wife. From India, the celebrated blue stone has changed hands often, moving from location to location in distant corners of the world.
In the middle of the seventeenth century, a trader from France named Jean Baptiste Tavernier acquired the large blue diamond, which was rumored to have been illegally removed from a temple Tavemier returned to France with the big blue gem, where the stone was purchased by the Sun King Louis XIV. Louis XIV had it cut down from 112 to 67 carats to make its shape symmetrical and to maximize its sparkle. The newly cut diamond, still huge by any standards, was passed down through the royal family of France, until it arrived in the hands of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette.
During the French Revolution, Louis XVI and his wife met their fate on the guillotine in 1793, and the big blue diamond disappeared from public sight.
The diamond somehow managed to get from France to England, where banker Henry Hope purchased it from a gem dealer early in the nineteenth century. The huge blue stone was cut into a 45.5-carat oval, and at this point it took on the name by which it is known today. The diamond stayed in the Hope family for around a century, when deep indebtedness brought on by a serious gambling habit on the part of one of Henry Hope's heirs forced the sale of the diamond.
From England, the Hope Diamond may have made its way into the hands of the Sultan of Turkey; whatever route it took to get there, it eventually went on to the United States when American Evelyn Walsh McLean purchased it in 1911. Mrs.
McLean certainly enjoyed showing the diamond off guests in her home were sometimes astounded to notice the huge stone embellishing the neck of Mrs. McLean’s Great Dane as the huge pet trotted around the grounds of her Washington, D.C. home. The Hope Diamond later became the property of jeweler Harry Winston, who presented the stunning 45.5- carat piece to the Smithsonian in 1958. The Hope Diamond is now taking a well-earned rest following its rigorous travel itinerary and is on display at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., where it has been since 1958.

The paragraph preceding the passage most likely discussed