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. 
THE RISE OF OLDER CITIES
        Many older cities are having modern makeovers and they are being given a new (1) ______. Sometimes the impetus for this type of change comes from the need to provide new facilities for particular events being held in the city - a sporting event, or something similar. On other occasions the change just seems to take place almost naturally. 
        Take Birmingham, for instance, (2) ________ it was previously an unfashionable place to live, it has now become trendy, and this change has been brought about largely by the new-look architecture that can be found everywhere in the city. The old shopping centre has been knocked down and completely rebuilt, and new shopping malls are (3) ________ to attract shoppers with the high quality of their services and goods. The area located around the canal, once hidden away and surrounded by decaying factories was often used as a rubbish tip, but it has now become a trendy place made up of modern offices, bars, sought-after apartments and restaurants. To (4)_________ up, Birmingham has become the place to be. Even in what was formerly the poorest part of the city an old factory has been converted into a lively complex of studios, galleries and coffee bars. With its theatres, museums and football teams Birmingham is (5) _______ worth visiting and has something for everyone. 

(2)...................

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Despite these drawbacks, (25) ______the retirement age is still considered by policymakers as one of the key solutions to the ageing population problem in Vietnam, But these are only temporary solutions. Complementary long-term solutions such as increasing labor productivity must also be examined.
As Vietnam has specialized in manufacturing with its competitive advantage of a cheap labor force in the global supply chain, (26)______higher education should be reoriented to focus more on vocational training rather than university degrees. The Vietnamese government has already taken action by simplifying the entrance exam to university. Previously, Vietnam's national entrance exam was very difficult and only a limited number of the most talented citizens managed to enter universities.
However, as living standards in Vietnam improve and more families can afford to send their children to university, universities have become more commercialized and entering university is no longer a rare achievement. The low quality of Vietnamese universities also means the majority of graduating students are unable to find an appropriate job. By simplifying entrance exams to deemphasize university degrees, the government has encouraged students to opt for vocational training. (37)_______, 2016 saw a remarkable decrease in the number of students applying (28) ______university. 
Another supplementary policy is to have productivity-based rather than seniority-based salaries, (29) _______ are common in Asian countries. This would address public concern about aged seniors doing less work for more pay than younger employees. Companies and government agencies would employ and appreciate the young while benefiting from the experience of the old. But this issue feeds the Communist regime's dilemma between adhering to Communist principles and integrating into the capitalist culture of productivity for profits.

(28)........................

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Recreational diving or sport diving is a type of diving that uses scuba equipment for the purpose of leisure and enjoyment. In some diving circles, the term "recreational diving" is used in contradistinction to "technical diving", a more demanding aspect of the sport  which  requires greater levels of training, experience and equipment.
Recreational scuba diving grew out of related activities such as snorkeling and underwater hunting. For a long time, recreational underwater excursions were limited by the  amount of  breath that could be held. However, the invention of the aqualung in 1943 by Jacques-Yves Cousteau and its development over subsequent years led to a revolution in recreational diving. However, for much of the 1950s and early1960s, recreational scuba diving was a  sport limited to  those who were able to afford or make their own kit, and prepared to undergo intensive training to use it. As the sport became more popular, manufacturers became aware of the potential market, and equipment began to appear that was easy to use, affordable and reliable. Continued advances in' SCUBA technology, such as buoyancy compensators, modern diving regulators, wet or dry suits,  and dive computers, increased the safety, comfort and convenience of the gear encouraging more people to train and use it.
Until the early 1950s, navies and other organizations performing professional diving were   the only providers of diver training, but only for their own personnel and only using their own    types of equipment. There were no training courses available to civilians who bought the  first  scuba equipment. Professional instruction started in 1959 when the non-profit National Association of Underwater Instructors was formed.
Further developments in technology have reduced the cost of training and diving. Scuba- diving has become a popular leisure activity, and many diving locations have some form of  dive  shop presence that can offer air fills, equipment and training. In tropical and sub-tropical parts of the world, there is a large market in holiday divers, who train and dive while on holiday, but rarely dive  close to home. Generally, recreational diving depths are limited to a maximum of between 30 and 40 meters (100 and 130 feet), beyond which a variety of safety issues make it unsafe to dive using recreation diving equipment and practices, and specialized training and equipment for technical diving are needed.

Recreational underwater excursions used to be limited    _.

Fiberscopes are one of the most important Outcomes of the science of fiber optics. Fibers made of glass and transparent acrylic plastic are capable of conveying light energy, and when thousands of these fibers are combined in what is called a fiberscope, they can transmit images. The most common fiberscopes contain about 750,000 fibers, each 0.001 centimeter, or 10 microns, in diameter. For certain uses, the diameter of the fiber may be as small as 5 microns.
Fiberscopes have a wide range of applications. In the medical field, physicians use fiberscopes to examine internal organs and as an aid in delicate surgeries. Miniature probes have also been developed to view muscle fiber, skin tissue, and blood cells. Fiberscopes have also found varied uses in industry, particularly to inspect or control operations in inaccessible areas. Bundles of fiberscopes fused together in a solid plate, called a faceplate, are being used in the manufacture of television picture tubes and other cathode-ray tube devices. 
The most far-reaching applications of fiber-optic technology are in communications. Optical fibers carry voice messages for telephone service. The sound of the voice is electronically broken down into thousands of pulses per second, which causes a transmitting laser to send coordinated pulses of light through the optical fibers. At the receiving end, the light pulses are converted to electrical signals and the voice message is reconstructed. Light-wave communication systems can handle an immensely greater number of telephone calls and television programs than the current system, and they will form the basis of the "electronic superhighway" expected to crisscross the nation in the near future of the information age.

It can be inferred from the passage that fiberscopes ________

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Because geologists have long indicated that fossil fuels will not last indefinitely, the U.S government finally acknowledged that sooner or later other energy sources would be needed and, as a result, turned its attention to nuclear power. It was anticipated that nuclear power plants could supply electricity in such large amounts and so inexpensively that they would be integrated into an economy in which electricity would take over virtually all fuel-generating functions at nominal cost. Thus, the government subsidized the promotion of commercial nuclear power plants and authorized their construction by utility companies. In the 1960s and early 1970s, the public accepted the notion of electricity being generated by nuclear power plants in or near residential areas. By 1975, 54 plants were fully operational, supplying 11 percent of the nation’s electricity, and another 167 plants were at various stages of planning and construction. Officials estimated that by 1990 hundreds of plants would be on line, and by the turn of the century as many as 1000 plants would be in working order.
Since 1975, this outlook and this estimation have changed drastically, and many utilizes have cancelled existing orders. In some cases, construction was terminated even after billions of dollars had already been invested. After being completed and licensed at a cost of almost $6 billion, the Shoreham Power Plant on Long Island was turned over to the state of New York to be dismantled without ever having generated electric power. The reason was that residents and state authorities deemed that there was no possibility of evacuating residents from the area should an accident occur.
Just 68 of those plants under way in 1975 have been completed, and another 3 are still under construction. Therefore, it appears that in the mid1990s 124 nuclear power plants in the nation will be in operation, generating about 18 percent of the nation’s electricity, a figure that will undoubtedly decline as relatively outdated plants are shut down.

What was initially planned for the nation’s fuel supply in the 1950s and in the early 1960s?

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Some doctors think that you should drink a glass of water each morning. You should drink this water first thing before doing anything else. The (25) ______ of the water should be similar to body temperature; (26) ______ too hot nor too cold. Why should you drink this water? Water helps your body in many ways. It helps clean out your kidneys. It prepares your stomach for (27) ______, Water can also help your intestines work better. After drinking water, the intestines can more easily take out nutrients from our food. Water also helps us go to the bathroom more easily,
Scientists suggest that people (28) ______ 1,600 milliliters of water each day. But don't drink all of that water in one sitting. If you do, your kidneys will have to work much harder to eliminate it. It's better to drink some in the morning and some in the afternoon. Some people think it's better to drink between meals and not during meals. They think water dilutes the juices produced in our stomachs, (29) ______ can interfere with normal digestion. Are you drinking enough water every day? Check the color of your urine. If it is light yellow, you are probably drinking enough. If your urine is very dark yellow, you probably need to drink more water. A little more water each day could make you much healthier!

(28).........................

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Martin Luther King, Jf, is well- known for his work in civil rights and for his many famous speeches, among which is his moving “I have a dream” speech. But fewer people know much about King’s childhooD. M.L., as he was called, was bom in 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia, at the home of his maternal grandfather. M.L.’s grandfather purchased their home on Auburn Avenue in 1909, twenty years before M.L was bom. His grandfather allowed the house to be used as a meeting place for a number of organizations dedicated to the education and social advancement of blacks. M.L. grew up in the atmosphere, with his home being used as a community gathering place, and was no doubt influenced by it.
M.L.’s childhood was not especially eventfully. His father was a minister and his mother was a musician. He was the second of three children, and he attended all black schools in a black neighborhood. The neighborhood was not poor, however. Auburn Avenue was an area of banks, insurance companies, builders, jewelers, tailors, doctors, lawyers, and other businesses and services. Even in the face of Atlanta’s segregation, the district thrived. Dr. King never forgot the community spirit he had known as a child, nor did he forget the racial prejudice that was a huge barrier keeping black Atlantans from mingling with whites.

Which of the following statements is NOT true?

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Pollution emitted in industrial areas represents a threat to human health and the surrounding natural resources. We have a tendency to  believe that the  production processes are  the only source of environmental damage, and often forget about the possible long-term effects of harmful production practices. We may think that the closure of these huge industrial areas would improve the quality of the environment. Unfortunately, this ignores the threat of the remaining waste, which is abandoned and poorly stored. It  represents an even bigger danger because it  stands neglected as it degrades and leaks into the earth without any control at all.
Changes in the water chemistry due to surface water contamination can affect all levels of an ecosystem. It can affect the health of lower food chain organisms and, consequently, the availability of food up through the food chain. It can damage the health of wetlands and damage  their ability to support healthy ecosystems, control flooding, and filter pollutants from storm water runoff. The health of animals and humans are affected when they drink or bathe in contaminated water. In addition water-based organisms, like fish and shellfish, can pile up and concentrate contaminants in their bodies. When other animals or humans eat  these organisms,  they receive a much higher dose of contaminant than they would have if they had been directly exposed to the original contamination.
Contaminated groundwater can badly affect animals, plants and humans if it is removed from the ground by manmade or natural processes. Depending on the study of rocks of the area, groundwater may rise to the surface through springs or seeps, flow sideways into nearby rivers, streams, or ponds, or sink deeper into the earth. In many parts of fhe world, groundwater is pumped  out of the ground to be used for drinking, bathing, other household uses, agriculture, and industry.
Contaminants in the soil can harm plants when they take up the contamination through  their roots. Eating, breathing in, or touching contaminated soil, as well as eating plants or animals that have piled up soil contaminants can badly affect the health of humans and animals.
Air pollution can cause breathing-related problems and other bad health effects as contaminants are absorbed from the lungs into other parts of the  hody. Certain air  contaminants  can also harm animals and humans when they contact the skin. Plants rely on breathing for their growth and can also be affected by exposure to contaminants moved in the air.

Which of the followings has the closest meaning to the word "absorbed" in the last paragraph?

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The tourist looking at the African savannah on a summer afternoon might be excused for thinking that the wide yellow grass plain was completely deserted of life, almost a desert. With only a few small thorn trees sticking out through the veldt, there seems to be almost no place for a living creature to hide.
However, under those trees you might find small steenbok, sleeping in the shade, and waiting for the night to fall. There may even be a small group of lions somewhere, their bodies exactly the same shade as the tall grass around them. In the holes in the ground a host of tiny creatures, from rabbits and badgers to rats and' snakes are waiting for the heat to finish.
The tall grass also hides the fact that there may be a small stream running across the middle of the plain. One clue that there may be water here is the sight of a majestic Marshall eagle circling slowly over the grassland. When he drops, he may come up with a small fish, or maybe a grass snake that has been waiting at the edge of a pool in the hope of catching a frog.
The best time to see the animals then, is in the evening, just as the sun is setting. The best time of the year to come is in late September, or early August, just before the rains. Then the animals
must come to the waterholes, as there is no other place for them to drink. And they like to come while it is still light; so they can see if any dangers are creeping up on them.
So it is at sunset, and after the night falls, that the creatures of the African veld rise and go about their business.

By "go about their business" the writer means:

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      Urbanization degrades the environment, according to conventional wisdom. This view has led many developing countries to limit rural - urban migration and curb urban expansion. But this view is incorrect. There are a number of reasons urbanization can be good for the environment, if managed properly.
      First, urbanization brings higher productivity because of its positive externalities and economies of scale. Asian urban productivity is more than 5.5 times that of rural areas. The same output can be produced using fewer resources with urban agglomeration than without. In this sense, urbanization reduces the ecological footprint. The service sector requires urbanization because it needs a concentration of clients. As services generally pollute less than manufacturing, this aspect of urbanization is also beneficial to the environment.
      Second, for any given population, the high urban density is benign for the environment. The urban economics literature shows that compactness is a key determinant of energy use. High density can make public transport more viable and reduce the length of trips. Urban living encourages walking and cycling rather than driving. Third, environment-friendly infrastructure and public services such as piped water, sanitation, and waste management are much easier and more economical to construct, maintain, and operate in an urban setting. Urbanization allows more people to have access to environment-friendly facilities and services at affordable prices.
     Fourth, urbanization drives innovation, including green technologies. In the long term, environment-friendly equipment, machines, vehicles, and utilities will determine the future of the green economy. Green innovations in Asia's cities will be supported by the region's vast market as the billions of people who will be buying energy-efficient products will create opportunities and incentives for entrepreneurs to invest in developing such products. Finally, the higher standard of living associated with urbanization provides people with better food, education, housing, and health care. Urban growth generates revenues that fund infrastructure projects, reducing congestion and improving public health. Urbanization fosters a pro-environment stance among property owners and the middle class, which is crucial for the introduction and enforcement of environmental laws and regulations.
      Of course, urbanization also comes with costs. Millions of people are migrating to Asian cities and companies are locating there to employ them. Urban sprawl and industrial activities, such as power generation, transportation, construction, garbage and waste disposal, harm the environment. An assessment of the impact of urbanization on the environment must balance its benign and adverse effects.

The word “footprint” in paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to ______.

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Oxford University scientists have launched an attempt to bring the Northern White Rhinoceros back from beyond the “point of no return” using IVF (In Vitro Fertilization). The team believes a pioneering treatment can prompt a revival of the persecuted species, despite the death last year of the last known male and the fact that the two remaining females, Najin and Fatu, cannot have calves.
One of two subspecies of White Rhinoceros, the Northern Rhinoceros once ranged over tracts of Uganda, Sudan, Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of Congo. However, the value of its horns saw it poached from a population of approximately 500 to 15 in the 1970s and 1980s. A small recovery – numbers reached 32 – from the early 1990s was then reversed from 2003 when illegal hunting intensified again.
The Oxford researchers believe that it will be possible to remove ovarian tissue from the animals and stimulate it to produce eggs, which would then be fertilised from sperm preserved from male Northern White Rhinoceros. The embryos would then be implanted into a surrogate mother of a similar species, probably a Southern White Rhinoceros. The technique has been used successfully in mice for nearly two decades; it has also been accomplished for some species of dog, horse and cat. However, it has never been attempted before on a rhinoceros, meaning the Oxford team plan to perfect it first by conducting a series of trials on ovarian tissue taken from a Southern White Rhinoceros.
In principal, the benefit of removing ovarian tissue for use in the lab is that it can go on producing eggs. Other researchers are exploring the possibility of using the remaining Northern White Rhinoceros sperm to cross–breed with Southern White Rhinoceros, however Dr Williams believes the focus should be on preserving the identity of the northern species. “This will be a huge buffer against disease and ill health in the long–term, and give the new herds better genetic ability to adapt to changing environments in the future.”
Najin was born in captivity in 1989 and Fatu in 2000. They both belong to the Cvur Kralove Zoo in the Czech Republic, which shipped them to the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya in 2009 amid tight security. In place of their horns, keepers have fitted radio transmitters to allow close monitoring of their whereabouts in the large paddock areas. The team has enough funding for three years’ research, donated from Fondation Hoffman, however Oxford University has launched a public appeal to raise the money to secure the project long term.

Which of the following best serves as the title for the passage?

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Birds have evolved many physical attributes that contribute to their flying ability. Wings are important, but adjustable tails, large hearts and light bones play critical roles.
To fly, birds, like airplanes, move air across their wings. Wings are designed so that air above the wings is forced to move faster than air below the wing. This creates higher pressure under the wings, called lift, which pushes the bird up. Different wing types evolved for different ways of flying. Prolonged flight requires long wings and an ability to soar. Other birds need superior maneuverability. Finches and sparrows
have short, broad wings. Faster birds, like hawks, have built-in spoilers that reduce turbulence while flying. This allows a steeper angle of attack without stalling.
Tails have evolved for specialized use. The tail acts like a rudder helping birds steer. Birds brake by spreading out their tails as they land. This adaptation allows them to make sudden, controlled stops-an essential skill, since most birds need to land on individual branches or on prey.
Flight takes muscle strength. If body builders has wings, they still could not flap hard enough to leave the ground. Birds have large, specialized hearts that beat much faster than the human heart and
provide the necessary oxygen to the muscles. The breast muscle accounts for 15 percent of the bird’s body weight. On pigeons, it accounts for a third of their total body weight.
Birds carry no excess baggage; they have hollow feathers and hollow bones with struts inside to maintain strength, like cross beams in a bridge. Birds fly to find prey, escape predators, and attract mates- in other words, to survive.

According to the passage, what benefit comes from having built-in spoilers?

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How is the news different from entertainment? Most people would answer that news is real but entertainment is fiction. However, if we think more carefully about the news, it becomes clear that the news is not always real. The news does not show us all the events of the day, but stories  from a small number of chosen events. The creation of news stories is subject to specific constraints, much like the creation of works of fiction. There are many constraints, but three of the most important ones are: commercialism, story formulas, and sources.
Newspapers, radio, and TV stations are businesses, all of which are rivals for audiences and advertising revenue. The amount of time that the average TV station spends on news broadcasts has grown steadily over the last fifty years - largely because news is relatively cheap to produce, yet sells plenty of advertising. Some news broadcasts are themselves becoming advertisements. For example, during one week in 1996 when the American CBS network was airing a movie about the sinking of the Titanic, CBS news ran nine stories about that event (which had happened 84 years before). The ABC network is owned by Disney Studios, and frequently runs news stories about Mickey Mouse. Furthermore, the profit motive drives news organizations to pay more attention to stories likely to generate a large audience, and to shy away from stories that may be important but dull. This pressure to be entertaining has produced shorter, simpler stories: more focus on celebrities than people of substance, more focus on gossip than on news, and more focus on dramatic events than on nuanced issues.
As busy people under relentless pressure to produce, journalists cannot spend days agonizing over the best way to present stories. Instead, they depend upon certain story formulas, which they can reuse again and again. One example is known as the inverted pyramid. In this formula, the journalist puts the most important information at the beginning of the story, than adds the next most important, and so on. The inverted pyramid originates from the age of the telegraph, the idea being that if the line went dead halfway through the story, the journalist would know that the most crucial information had at least been relayed. Modern journalists still value the formula for a similar reason. Their editors will cut stories if they are too long. Another formula involves reducing a complicated story into a simple conflict. The best example is "horse race" election coverage. Thorough explication of the issues and the candidates' views is forbiddingly complex. Journalists therefore concentrate more on who is winning in the opinion polls, and whether the underdog can catch up in the numbers than on politicians' campaign goals.
Sources are another constraint on what journalists cover and how they cover it. The dominant sources for news are public information officers in businesses and government offices. The majority of such officers try to establish themselves as experts who are qualified to feed information to journalists. How do journalists know who is an expert? In general, they don't. They use sources not on the basis of actual expertise, but on the appearance of expertise and the willingness to share it. All the major news organizations use some of the same sources (many of them anonymous), so the same types of stories always receive attention. Over time, the journalists may even become close friends with their sources, and they stop searching for alternative points of view. The result tends to be narrow, homogenized coverage of the same kind.

According to the passage, which of the following tends to lead to homogenized coverage?

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Body language is a vital form of communication. In fact, it is believed that the various forms of body language contribute about 70 percent to our comprehension. It is important to note, however, that body languages varies in different cultures. Take for example, eye movement. In the USA a child is expected to look directly at a parent or teacher who is scolding him/her. In other cultures the opposite is true. Looking directly at a teacher or parent in such a situation is considered a sign of disrespect.
Another form of body language that is used differently, depending on the culture, is distance. In North America people don’t generally stand as close to each other as in South America. Two North Americans who don’t know each other well will keep a distance of four feet between them, whereas South Americans in the same situation will stand two to three feet apart. North Americans will stand closer than two feet apart only if they are having a confidential conversation or if there is intimacy between them.
Gestures are often used to communicate. We point a finger, raise an eyebrow, wave an arm – or move any other part of the body - to show what we want to say. However, this does not mean that people all over the world use the same gestures to express the same meanings. Very often we find that the same gestures can communicate different meanings, depending on the country. An example of a gesture that could be misinterpreted is sticking out the tongue. In many cultures it is a sign of making a mistake, but in some places it communicates ridicule.
The dangers of misunderstanding one another are great. Obviously, it is not enough to learn the language of another culture. You must also learn its non-verbal signals if you want to communicate successfully.

What is the passage mainly about?

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Henry is the undisputed star of Dronfield School near Sheffield. Whatever the achievements of other members of the comprehensive school, it is Henry, with his soulful eyes and glossy hair, who has hogged the limelight, appearing on television in Britain and abroad. Yet despite all the public adulation, Henry stirs up no envy or resentment among the 2000 students – in fact, they all adore him. The dog, who first arrived six months ago, is a super dog, who has improved students’ behaviour and encouraged more students to focus on their academic achievement.
Andrew Wainwright, a student at Dronfield School, says there is something magical and calming about being able to interact with Henry during his time at the school’s catch-up classes, and that if he falls behind, that opportunity will be denied. Even doubting staff have finally been won round. Perhaps that is because Henry, who lies on the floor during staff meetings, has also had a calming effect on them.
It was Andrew’s teacher, Wendy Brown and the school counsellor, Julie Smart, who first proposed buying a school dog. “Julie and I were talking one day about how looking after dogs can positively affect children’s conduct,” says Brown. “We did some research and discovered that the presence of pets has been shown to be therapeutic. A number of studies have shown that animals improve recovery after surgery or illness and have a calming influence on people in a lot of settings. Some of my kids can be a handful and some of the children Julie counsels have terrible problems.”
Could the school dog become a craze? Other schools such as the Mulberry Bush, a primary school for children with behavioural problems, have stepped forward to point out they already have one. Rosie Johnston, a Mulberry staff member has been bringing her golden retriever, Muskoka, into school for three years. Apart from being a calming influence, Muskoka even plays his part in literacy lessons. Children at the school can be too shy to read to adults so they read to Muskoka. “Their anxiety about mispronouncing something or getting the words in the wrong order is reduced when they read to him,” says Johnston.
Psychologist Dr Deborah Wells from Queen's University Belfast specialises in animal-human interaction. She believes that the underlying key to the Henry effect is that dogs offer unconditional love and that cheers up adults and children and helps with self-esteem. But traditionalist Chris Woodhead, the former chief inspector of schools says, “I don’t see why a teacher cannot create a positive learning environment through the subject they teach and their personality. Dogs strike me as a bit of a publicity stunt. It’s the kind of sentimental story journalists love.” Despite this sentiment, Henry remains as popular as ever.

Which of the following is implied in the passage?

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The human criterion for perfect vision is 20/20 for reading the standard lines on a Snellen eye chart without a hitch. The score is determined by how well you read lines of letters of different sizes from 20 feet away. But being able to read the bottom line on the eye chart does not approximate perfection as far as other species are concerned. Most birds would consider us very visually handicapped. The hawk, for instance, has such sharp eyes that it can spot a dime on the sidewalk while perched on top of the Empire State Building.
It can make fine visual distinctions because it is blessed with one million cones per square millimeter in its retina. And in water, humans are farsighted, while the kingfisher, swooping down to spear fish, can see well in both the air and water because it is endowed with two foveae - areas of the eye, consisting mostly of cones, that provide visual distinctions. One fovea permits the bird, while in the air, to scan the water below with one eye at a time. This is called monocular vision. Once it hits the water, the other fovea joins in, allowing the kingfisher to focus both eyes, like binoculars, on its prey at the same time.
A frog’s vision is distinguished by its ability to perceive things as a constant motion picture. Known as “bug detectors”, a highly developed set of cells in a frog’s eyes responds mainly to moving objects. So, it is said that a frog sitting in a field of dead bugs wouldn’t see them as food and would starve. The bee has a “compound” eye, which is used for navigation. It has 15,000 facets that divide what it sees into a pattern of dots, or mosaic. With this kind of vision, the bee sees the sun only as a single dot, a constant point of reference. Thus, the eye is a superb navigational instrument that constantly measures the angle of its line of flight in relation to the sun. A bee’s eye also gauges flight speed. And if that is not enough to leave our 20/20 “perfect vision” paling into insignificance, the bee is capable of seeing something we can’t - ultraviolet light.
Thus, what humans consider to be “perfect vision” is in fact rather limited when we look at other species. However, there is still much to be said for the human eye. Of all the mammals, only humans and some primates can enjoy the pleasures of color vision.

Which of the following can be inferred from the passage?

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Very few people in the modem world obtain their food supply by hunting and gathering in the natural environment surrounding their homes. This method of harvesting from nature’s provision is the oldest known subsistence strategy and has been practised for at least the last two million years. It was, indeed, the only way to obtain food until rudimentary farming and the domestication of wild animals were introduced about 10,000 years ago.
Because hunter-gatherers have fared poorly in comparison with their agricultural cousins, their numbers have dwindled, and they have been forced to live in marginal environments, such as deserts and arctic wastelands. In higher latitudes, the shorter growing seasons have restricted the availability of plant life. Such conditions have caused a greater dependence on hunting, and on fishing along the coasts and waterways. The abundance of vegetation in the lower latitudes of the tropics, on the other hand, has provided a greater opportunity for gathering a variety of plants. In short, the environmental differences have restricted the diet and have limited possibilities for the development of subsistence societies.
Contemporary hunter-gatherers may help US understand our prehistoric ancestors. We know from the observation of modem hunter-gatherers in both Africa and Alaska that a society based on hunting and gathering must be very mobile. While the entire community camps in a central location, a smaller party harvests the food within a reasonable distance from the camp. When the food in the area has become exhausted, the community moves on to exploit another site. We also notice seasonal migration patterns evolving for most hunter-gatherers, along with a strict division of labor between the sexes. These patterns of behavior may be similar to those practised by mankind during the Paleolithic Period.

In the lower latitudes of the tropics, hunter-gatherers     .

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In today's competitive world, what responsible parent would not want to give their children the best possible start in life? For this reason, many parents want their children, often as young as ten months old, to become familiar with computers. They seem to think that if their children grow up with computers, they will be better equipped to face the challenges of the future.
No one has proved that computers make children more creative or more intelligent. The truth may even be the opposite. Educational psychologists claim that too much exposure to computers, especially for the very young, may negatively affect normal brain development. Children gain valuable experience of the world from their interaction with physical objects. Ten–month–old babies may benefit more from bumping their heads or putting various objects in their mouths than they will from staring at eye–catching cartoons. A four–year–old child can improve hand–eye coordination and understand cause and effect better by experimenting with a crayon than by moving a cursor around a computer screen. So, as educational psychologists suggest, instead of government funding going to more and more computer classes, it might be better to devote resources to music and art programs.
It is ludicrous to think that children will fall behind if they are not exposed to computers from an early age. Time is too precious to spend with a "mouse". Now is the time when they should be out there learning to ride a bike. There will be time later on for them to start banging away at keyboards.

The pronoun “they” in paragraph 2 refer to     .

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

"In the us, colleges of pharmacy offer five-year undergraduate programs (1)….. to the degree of Bachelor of Science in the pharmaceutical Sciences. AU (2)….  students directly from high schools (3)…..  may grant advanced standing to college students or graduates. Licenses are granted by the States after the following requirements have been (4)…. : graduation from one of 72 colleges with programs (5)…..  by the American council on Pharmaceutical Education; about 1,500 hours of internship (6)……  a registered pharmacist; (7)….. completion of a State examination. Pharmacists may practise their (8)…..  in a pharmacy located in a hospital, nursing home, or special area of a drugstore. They may also be (9)……   by a pharmaceutical company in scientific research for the (10)……  and production of new pharmaceutical Products."

3. students directly from high schools (3)…..  may grant advanced standing to college students or graduates. 

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 modem comic strip started out as ammunition in a newspaper was between giants of the American press in the late nineteenth century. The first full-color comic strip appeared in January 1894 in the New York World, owned by Joseph Pulitzer. The first regular weekly full- color comic supplement, similar to today's Sunday funnies, appeared two years later, in William Randolph Hearst's rival New York paper, the Morning Journal.
Both were immensely popular, and publishers realized that supplementing the news with comic relief boosted the sale of papers. The Morning Journal started another feature in 1896, the "Yellow Kid," the first continuous comic character in the United States, whose creator, Richard Outcault, had been lured away from the World by the ambitious Hearst. The "Yellow Kid" was in many ways a pioneer. Its comic dialogue was the strictly urban farce that came to characterize later strips, and it introduced the speech balloon inside the strip, usually placed above the characters' heads.
The first strip to incorporate all the elements of later comics was Rudolph Dirks's "Katzenjammer Kids", based on Wilhelm Busch's Max and Moritz, a European satire of the nineteenth century. The "Kids" strip, first published in 1897, served as the prototype for future American strips. It contained not only speech balloons, but a continuous cast of characters, and was divided into small regular panels that did away with the larger panoramic scenes of the earliest comics.
Newspaper syndication played a major role in spreading the popularity of comic strips throughout the country. Though weekly colored comics came first, daily black-and-white strips were not far behind. They first appeared in the Chicago American in 1904. It was followed by many imitators, and by 1915 black-and-white comic strips had become a staple of daily newspaper; around the country.

According to the passage, the “Yellow Kid” was the first     comic strip to do all of the following EXCEPT    .

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 tourist looking at the African savannah on a summer afternoon might be excused for thinking that the wide yellow grass plain was completely deserted of life, almost a desert. With only a few small thorn trees sticking out through the veldt, there seems to be almost no place for a living creature to hide.
However, under those trees you might find small steenbok, sleeping in the shade, and waiting for the night to fall. There may even be a small group of lions somewhere, their bodies exactly the same shade as the tall grass around them. In the holes in the ground a host of tiny creatures, from rabbits and badgers to rats and' snakes are waiting for the heat to finish.
The tall grass also hides the fact that there may be a small stream running across the middle of the plain. One clue that there may be water here is the sight of a majestic Marshall eagle circling slowly over the grassland. When he drops, he may come up with a small fish, or maybe a grass snake that has been waiting at the edge of a pool in the hope of catching a frog.
The best time to see the animals then, is in the evening, just as the sun is setting. The best time of the year to come is in late September, or early August, just before the rains. Then the animals
must come to the waterholes, as there is no other place for them to drink. And they like to come while it is still light; so they can see if any dangers are creeping up on them.
So it is at sunset, and after the night falls, that the creatures of the African veld rise and go about their business.

The phrase "a host of" in paragraph 2 is closest in meaning to