SỞ GD&ĐT VĨNH PHÚC KỲ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI LỚP 12

————————— CHƯƠNG TRÌNH THPT CHUYÊN NĂM HỌC 2017 - 2018

ĐỀ THI CHÍNH THỨC ĐỀ THI MÔN: TIẾNG ANH
Thời gian làm bài: 180 phút, không kể thời gian giao đề

(Đề thi gồm: 11 trang)

A. LISTENING (Each recording will be played twice)

Part I. You will hear three different extracts.

For questions 1-6, choose the answer A, B or C which fits best according to what you hear.
There are two questions for each extract.

Extract One

You hear a man talking about a new project being launched in a group of small Atlantic islands.

1. What is the main objective of the project?

A. to raise environmental awareness
B. to encourage tourism in the islands
C. to follow the movements of tides
2. What is the speaker’s opinion of the new project?
A. The idea is over-ambitious.
B. The approach is innovative.
C. The experiment is unscientific.

Extract Two

You hear part of an interview with an art critic, in which an exhibition featuring the latest work of
photographer Tim Fitzgerald is discussed.
3. What is the art critic’s opinion of Fitzgerald’s latest work?
A. It demonstrates his lack of artistic range.
B. It compares favourably with his previous work.
C. It shows his poor understanding of relationships.
4. The art critic says that Fitzgerald’s pictures in the current show____
A. are unsuitable for rounding off the exhibition.
B. do not manage to engage the visitor’s interest.
C. lack artistic originality.

Extract Three

You hear a woman talking on the radio about her favourite piece of music.
5. How does the speaker say she feels when listening to her favourite piece of music?
A. engrossed B. nostalgic C. inspired
6. The speaker believes that critics of her favourite music are wrong to___
A. doubt the level of its popularity.
B. disregard the composer’s skills.
C. underrate it for its wide appeal.

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Part II. You will hear a nutritionist talking about the production and uses of mastic, a
spice that is found in the Mediterranean area.
For questions 7 – 15, complete the sentences with a word or short phrase.
Mastic is collected from a tree which looks like a smaller form of the (7) _________tree.
Mastic resin will (8) _________only in the region around the Mediterranean.
Basic tools like (9) _________are employed to remove impurities from the mastic.
Crystals of mastic have been referred to as (10) _________in literature.
The sale of mastic crystals is handled by a (11) _________to ensure that the growers get a fair deal.
It is thought that mastic was first used as (12) _________by ancient peoples.
When mastic is added to (13) _________ it slows down the melting process.
Flavoured drinks are made in (14) _________which have had mastic burned under them.
Some people believe that mastic can help in the treatment of health problems, especially some (15)
_________ conditions.

Part III. You will hear part of a discussion between two language experts, Geroge
Steadman and Angela Conti, who are talking about how advances in communication are
affecting English usage. For questions 16 – 20, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which fits
best according to what you hear.

16. What point is made about the effect of the internet on language?
A. It is making the standard written form of language obsolete.
B. It will radically alter the way grammar rules are followed.
C. It may have less serious consequences than feared.
D. It will bring about more changes than TV and radio have.
17. When discussing the main criticism of text messaging, Geroge reveals___
A. his concern that there is insufficient research.
B. his understanding of the annoyance some people feel.
C. his certainty that the criticism is totally unfounded.
D. his doubt as to how widespread the criticism is.
18. What view is stated about abbreviations in texting?
A. They are mainly to be found in commercial messages.
B. Some are beginning to enter official documents.
C. Adults are just as much to blame for them as teenagers.
D. They are not as novel as many people imagine.
19. When discussing the new genre of text-poetry, both researchers agree that ___
A. limiting a poem to a fixed number of letters is unhelpful.
B. it will never match some of the traditional verse forms.
C. it has potential if the writer is gifted.
D. the means of delivery is effective.
20. What final conclusion do both the resesearchers reach about the state of English today?
A. Language development need no longer be a concern in school.
B. The negative predictions about its decline are mistaken.
C. Children’s written style is improving significantly.
D. The pace of change is unprecedented.
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B. LEXICO-GRAMMAR

I. Choose the option A,B,C or D to complete the following sentences.

1. Having gained a _________victory in the general elections, they proceeded with their
ambitious programme.
A. landslide B. galloping C. staunch D. close-run
2. Just take a look at his neat appearance. It sticks out _________that he is a big shot.
A. a kilometre B. an inch C. a yard D. a mile
3. As the train pulled in, she_________him into its path. At that point the novel ends.
A. shoved B. yanked C. wrenched D. snatched
4. My ideal partner would have to be someone who wasn't too dependent on me, someone
who wasn't too_________.
A. graspy B. grippy C. huggy D. clingy
5. The accused man was proved innocent and was _________.
A. liberated B. excused C. interned D. acquitted
6. There was a very suspicous character _________in the shadows.
A. lurking B. peeping C. peering D. awaiting
7. For a moment it was difficult to see through the_________of the headlights.
A. shimmer B. glare C. glow D. glaze
8. Richard Burton was noted for his _________of words.
A. enunciation B. interpretation C. announcement D. accentuation
9. All he has done since losing his job is _________around the house all day.
A. mourn B. mope C. fly D. lie
10. Don’t waste your time telling Janet a joke; she’s totally _________of a sense of humour.
A. deficient B. missing C. devoid D. lacking

II. Use the word given in capitals below to form a word that fits in the space.

Cathy Come Home

Anyone over the age of fifty-five will have little problem remembering the (1)
________ docu-drama Cathy Come Home, directed by Ken Loach and written by Jeremy
Sandford in 1966. The gritty, black and white programme (2) ________ the struggle of a
young family who were sinking further and further into poverty and being failed by the
system in every way. For many of the affluent viewers of the time, it was a complete
revelation that people in the 1960s still had to endure such (3) ________ and they were truly
shocked at the final scene when the young mother’s children were forcibly taken from her in the
streets to be put into care.

Since Cathy Come Home, the battle against homelessness has made little (4)
_________. Charities and governmental projects do their best to assist those who are forced
out of their homes and onto the streets, and the majority of the public are sympathetic to their
plight, but against the (5) ________ of uncertain economic times, the number of homeless
people is increasing month by month. These days the public are all too aware of the problem.

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 Cathy Come Home recently came second in a nationwide poll to compile the most
influential TV programmes of the 20th century. The central issues are undeniably still
relevant today.

1. COMPEL 2. LIGHT 3. DEPRIVE 4. HEAD 5. DROP

C. READING
I. You are going to read an article about sleep. For questions 1-10, choose from the
sections (A-E). The sections may be chosen more than once.

In which section of the article are the following mentioned?

1. a pragmatic advantage of having shared sleeping arrangements

2. beliefs about the potential risks of too deep a sleep
3. a widespread assumption that sleeping routines are universal
4. an awareness that scientific research methods may be flawed
5. a re-evaluation of ideas about what represents typical sleeping environments
6. the ability to fall asleep as a method of self-protection
7. investigations currently being carried out into the science of sleep
8. the link between darkness and periods of sleep
9. a lack of research into sleeping customs across cultures
10. different cultural attitudes to irregular sleep patterns

HOW THE WORLD SLEEPS

Is there something we can learn from how people in different cultures sleep?
A.

It’s a familiar ritual in many parts of the world. You climb into bed, stifling a yawn. Maybe a
little reading or television to loosen you up for slumber. After a while, you nod off and sleep
until an alarm clock starts ringing. The twist, however, is that this ritual doesn’t apply to
people currently living outside the modern Western world or even to inhabitants of Western
Europe 200 years ago. Yet, as an anthropologist Carol Worthman discovered, sleep scarcely
figures in the literature of either cross-cultural differences or human evolution. It is generally
relegated to the sidelines, treated as a biological given with little potential for variation from
one part of the world to another.

B.

Worthman contacted researchers who had intimate knowledge of one or more traditional
societies, and uncovered a wide variety of customs, none of which bore any resemblance to
what many modern Western people take for granted. She says that this finding raises
profound questions for the research that is being done into our biological clock. Over the past
50 years, scientists have identified periods of rapid eye movement ( REM) sleep, during which
intense dreams often occur. Current efforts are examining genes involved in wakefulness and
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sleeping and have taken strides towards treating sleep disturbances. Although investigators
assume that people sleep alone or with a partner for a solid chunk of the night, most studies
take place in laboratories where individuals have naps while being hooked up to brain and
body monitors. However, the distinctive sleep styles of non-Western, more traditional groups
may shape the biology of sleep in ways undreamed of in sleep labs, which is why Worthman
was keen to initiate relevant research.

C.

Worthman assembled a preliminary picture of sleep practices in 10 non-Western populations.

Having observed how sleepers in traditional societies recline on skins, mats, wooden
platforms, the ground, or just about anything except a springy mattress, she says, it brought it
home to her just how odd the Western concept is of layers of bedding piled on a ‘giant sleep
machine’. Furthermore, unlike most Western bedrooms, sleep typically takes place in spaces
that feature constant background noise emanating from other sleepers and various domestic
animals. Communal space equates to safe space, invaluable in the event of a threat or
emergency.

D.

Virtually no-one in traditional societies, including children, keeps a regular bedtime. In these
worlds without artificial light, activity is limited and affects the time allotted to sleep;
individuals tend to slip in and out of slumber several times during the night, rather than
sleeping in a solid block of time. In traditional settings, variable sleep cycles among
individuals and age groups are useful so that someone can be awake or easily roused at all
times. Whereas, as Worthman points out, the natural tendency of teenagers in the Western
world to go to sleep late and wake up late is seen as a nuisance or as a sign of rebellion.
Equally, extreme early birds get diagnosed as sleep disordered.

E.

Some cultures, such as the Gebusi rainforest dwellers, are of the opinion that a person’s spirit
may wander off too far and fail to return if they sleep too heavily; dreaming makes this more
likely. Whether or not one believes this, a quick nap may be preferable and has crucial effects
on the body and mind. As an example, Balinese infants are carried about and held
continuously by caregivers so that they learn to fall asleep even in hectic and noisy situations.
This trains them to exhibit what the Balinese call ‘fear sleep’ later in life. Adults and children
enter fear sleep by suddenly slumping over in a deep slumber when they or family members
confront intense anxiety or an unexpected fright. They are litterally scared into sleep.
Conversely, it is possible that infants who sleep alone in the Western world may find it
difficult to relax, fall asleep, wake up or concentrate because of the contrast between the
sensory overload of the waking world and the dark quiet bedroom. Only cross-cultural studies
of children’s sleep and behaviour may be able to clarify such issues.

II. Six paragraphs have been removed from the following article. Choose from the
paragraphs (A-G) the one which fits each gap (1-6). There is one extra paragraph which
you do not need to use.
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 HEARD ANY GOOD FILMS LATELY?

Foley artists can recreate any sound, from the crunch of footsteps on snow to the rustle of a
book. Named after Jack Foley, the first person to turn a silent movie into a musical, these
specialists make an art of sound.

When directors shoot a film, they’re worried about capturing the action and the actor’s voice.
Nothing else. Not hearing a sword scraping against a tree or a court shoe tiptoeing aross a
marble floor. Well, the sword is probably made of plastic and the “marble” floor is probably
painted plywood. So when it comes to the edit, things don’t come across as they’re supposed to.

During this process, known as the ‘Foley’, the artists are responsible for making the
background noise sound as real as the dialogue. When done well, these effects are integrated
to the extent that they go unnoticed by the audience. It helps to create a sense of reality in a
scene, whether the noise is meant to come from inside or outside.

Foley can also be used to rectify a continuity problem. If an actor is holding something, but
forgets to bring it back into the shot, the sound of the object being put away off camera can be
inserted later. It can fill in blanks, too. Foley artist, Paul Hanks remembers a TV series in
which they forgot to film a horse. So they used sound to create the impression there was one
there. However, they don’t stop at just creating sounds!

Things have moved on a long way since 1927, when the art of sound began in films. In those
early days, microphones could only pick up dialogue, so Jack Foley had to add in the other
sounds later. He projected the film onto a screen and recorded the footsteps and the
movement all in one track. At that time, the sound had to match exactly what was going on.
Digital technology has meant the sounds can be manipulated to fit.

It is dreamed up at Universal Sound- the only studio in Britain to specialize solely in Foley.
From the outside, it could be an expensive home. There’s a swimming pool, where the sounds
for the Harry Porter computer games were recorded. But the heart of the operation is in the
middle of the house, where there are three studios with thick walls. The main studio, where
Hanks and mixer Simon Trundle are working, resembles a student bedsit.

Right now, he’s struggling with the sounds of table football. If this were a different project,
with a different budget, he would have rented a table. Instead he’s slamming the handle of a
broom into the spring mechanism of a toaster. ‘Too tinny,’ says Trundle.

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Alex Joseph, in the studio next door, has been responsible for the Foley on a wide range of
films and television. What he likes about Foley is that it’s absolutely unique in every film. And,
maybe because of his training as a psychologist, he is interested in subliminal messaging,
using sounds rather than visuals. ‘You can really play with people’s heads.’ he says. ‘I set up
characters before they even appear. It’s a bit of a dark art.’

PARAGRAPHS

A. But although the science has continued to develop, Foley is still all about the ‘performance’.
A footstep is not just a footstep; it can be angry, happy, sad, confused, clumsy, swaggering,
light, heavy. And that performance- which conveys the meaning to the viewers- could only
ever come from the human imagination.

B. The action they are recording culminates in a car pulling up at speed. As a protagonist runs
away, Hanks reaches for his box of ‘surfaces’, which contains everything from sand to gravel.
He runs his suede gloves across tarmac to recreate the sound of tyres and roots around in a
box of shoes for ‘running’.

C. Which is why everyday sounds like these have to be added in post-production in order to
enhance the quality of audio for TV, radio and video games as well as films. Any sound can be
created, from the swishing of clothing and footsteps to squeaky doors and breaking glass.

D. For example, in the absence of a bird, they might recreate the sound of flapping wings by
blowing up a pair of kitchen gloves, and then slapping them together in time with the action
on screen.

E. The entire opening of the film involves the hero, James Bond, chasing a villain. This high energy-
sequence is from Casino Royale and it is the work that the Foley artists are most proud of.

F. Running along the side of one wall, a Canadian mini-series is playing out in stop-start
chunks. There’s no brief from the director so it’s up to them to decide what needs to be
recorded. Hanks watches and listens, picking out the important sounds before recording the
Foley.

G. There is yet another way in which Foley art is the director’s friend. Often more than 80% of
film dialogue isn’t recorded ‘clean’. Maybe there was noise in the distance- a car for instance.
Forley can cover it up.

III. Read the following passage and do the tasks that follow.

TWO ARE BETTER THAN ONE

Antonella Sorace explains how bilingualism might affect children and answers some
questions about living and speaking with two languages.

A. Research on bilingual language and cognition shows that the human brain is perfectly
capable of dealing with two or more languages simultaneously from birth. In many parts of
the world growing up multilingual is the norm: if children hear enough of both languages and
have enough motivation and fun, they will pick them up. What many people don’t know is that
the experience of dealing with two languages seems to give bilingual children some general

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cognitive advantages in other domains. These advantages are particularly evident in tasks
that involve cognitive flexibility and the control of attention: bilingual children seem to be
better at selectively paying attention, at inhibiting irrelevant information, and at switching
between alternative solutions to a problem. In contrast, such children do not seem to have an
advantage over monolinguals with respect to functions that depend on the way knowledge is
represented. For example, they don’t seem to be any better at encoding problems, accessing
relevant knowledge, or drawing logical inferences.

B. What is the link between enhanced cognitive control and bilingualism? Bilingual speakers
must develop a powerful mechanism for keeping the two languages separate, so that fluency
in one language can be achieved without intrusions from the unwanted language. Therefore,
the bilingual child’s constant experience of having two languages available and inhibiting one
when the other is activated enhances their ability to multitask in other domains. There is
more good news for bilingual children: it’s been suggested that some of these cognitive
advantages are maintained in old age. If these results are confirmed by future research, it will
be possible to conclude that bilingualism provides a defence against the decline of general
processing functions that is a feature of normal cognitive aging.

C. A further spin-off of bilingualism is higher awareness of language and greater ability to

think about it and talk about it. Bilingual children have a greater ability to focus on the form of
language, abstracting away from meaning. Parents of bilingual children often report that their
children engage in ‘language play’ that may take the form of ‘funny accents’ or impossible
literal translations between one language and another. Many parents also report that bilingual
children have more precocious reading skills, and this has recently been confirmed
experimentally. Bilingual children recognise symbolic letter-sound correspondences earlier
than monolingual children, although this does not appear to be related to greater awareness
of the sounds themselves and it is also a function of the specific languages acquired as well as
of the level of proficiency attained.

D. Because of their experience of selecting languages according to the perceived linguistic

competence of the person they are addressing, bilingual children have also been said to have
an enhanced ‘awareness of the other’. This often goes under the heading of ‘Theory of Mind’,
which is a term used to describe the ability to understand other people’s mental states, and
more specifically that other people may have beliefs, desires and intentions different from
one’s own. The cognitive abilities involved in Theory of Mind normally emerge around the age
of 4 years in monolingual children; they are permanently impaired in autistic children. It has
been reported that bilingual children develop Theory of Mind, on average, a year earlier than
monolingual children. It is remarkable that the experience of dealing with two languages may
have such extensive repercussions in so many apparently unrelated domains of cognitive
development.

E. Do bilingual children confuse their languages? A hopelessly mixed language is the thing that
many parents in bilingual families typically fear, but recent research has completely
discredited this idea. First, using new techniques for studying whether babies can tell the
difference between one outside stimulus and another researchers have learnt that
monolingual babies’ perceptual abilities are remarkably fine-tuned very early on: they know
alot about what their language sounds like long before they start producing their first words,

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and even at the age of a few months will notice when someone who was speaking English
switches to speaking, say, Japanese. This makes it very implausible that bilingual children do
not realise that they are hearing two languages. Second, research on ‘code-switching’-
swapping back and forth between languages- shows that bilingual children, like bilingual
adults, often switch from one language to another in order to achieve particular
communicative effects. For example, even if they are talking in Language A, they may switch to
Language B to report something that somebody said, if the speech they are reporting was
originally in Language B. Or they may switch because of the topic they are talking about, or
simply to play games with their languages. Naturally, this kind of code-switching takes place
most often when talking to other bilingual children. Moreover, code-switching is not random
but generally obeys a remarkably strict grammar. For example, a Spanish-English bilingual
child is much more likely to say ‘La house’ than ‘The casa’ (Spanish article + English noun
rather than English article + Spanish noun), apparently favouring the combination that is
more informative in terms of grammatical features like gender and number. Far from
producing random mixings due to confusion, in other words, bilingual children know when
and how it is appropriate to mix their languages. There is also plenty of evidence that the
grammatical rules of each of the languages are kept separate most of the time in the course of
development.

F. While bilingual children usually are ‘late talkers’ who start speaking later than monolingual
children, there is little evidence that bilingual languages affect each other- they neither speed
up nor delay normal acquisition processes. Instead, children’s development in each of the two
languages follows the same milestones as in monolingual children.

The reading passage has six paragraphs, A-F. Which paragraph contains the following
information?

1. information about bilingual children’s sensitivity to their audience.

2. a summary of the benefits of being bilingual.
3. mention of the rate of language acquisition by bilingual children.
4. evidence that bilingual children are able to distinguish between their languages.
Complete the flow-chart below. Choose NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS from the
passage for each answer.

Cognitive control and

bilingualism

5. prevent................................... the
other language into chidren’s 7. promote increased attention
speech ..................the other to
the .............................................

6. increased .....................to do 8. may preserve cognitive

several things at the same time 9 abilities ...................................
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer?

Write:

YES if the writer’s views agree with the statement

NO if the writer’s views contradict the statement

NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this

9. Bilingualism does not improve all cognitive functions.

10. Bilingual children are more challenged by learning to read than monolingual children.
11. Bilingual children are particularly good at understanding complex language.
12. Bilingualism has surprisingly wide-ranging positive effects.
13. Bilingual parents often enjoy playing language games with their children.

IV. For questions 1-6, read the text below and think of the word which fits best each space.
Use only one word in each space.
CRIME WRITING
The lists of international top selling paperbacks have been dominated by American thriller
writers for a long time now, but these days the top spots on these lists are (1) ______ hotly
contested by an army of crime writers from Scandinavia. It seems that (2) _______ list is
complete without a book by Nesbo, Mankell, or others from Norway, Sweden, Denmark or
even Iceland. So, what (3) ______ behind the sudden influx of detective fiction from these
countries?

The Scandinavians (4)_________ probably say that this is nothing new. They have known for
decades that they have some of the greatest writers in the world. No, (5) _________is just the
rest of us that have been rather late in catching up. Mankell, Nesbo and others have been
writing brilliant novels for a long time but it (6) _________the staggering success of Stieg
Larsson’s Millenium Trilogy, starting with Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, to bring them to our
attention.

D. WRITING
I. Read the following extract and use your own words to summarize it. Your summary
should be about 80-100 words long.
NARCOLEPSY
Narcolepsy can be defined as a chronic neurological disorder which causes excessive
sleepiness and frequent daytime attacks. It is not just a case of dozing off and snoozing in a
lecture-narcoleptics actually can’t stop themselves from falling asleep during inappropriate
occasions. And possibly herein lies the problem- sleepiness can be caused by many factors so
it can take many months, years even, before a diagnosis, a correct one, is eventually made by a
doctor, but at the moment, narcolepsy is known to affect at least 2500 people in the UK.

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Perhaps there are more. The exact cause of narcolepsy is a matter of debate, but it is widely
believed to be the result of a genetic mutation. The result is that the brain doesn’t produce
enough of the hormone that regulates a person’s sleep-wake cycles. For many narcoleptics,
the symptoms aren’t just limited to nodding off when they shouldn’t. They can also suffer a
sudden loss of muscle control whenever they’ve just experienced a surge of emotion-perhaps
they were angry, or fearful or were even just laughing at a good joke. Then, during the night,
some narcoleptics suffer from sleep paralysis and during the day, in some cases, even
hallucinations are possible.

Let’s think about the consequences of this disorder. Not only do narcoleptics have to put up
with the physical challenges, but they have to deal with the ignorance of other people.
Sufferers are often mistakenly considered to be inebriated or lazy, for example. Narcoleptics
report that one of the things that really begins to disappear as a result of their condition is
their social life. It’s simply too difficult to manage a day or evening out. It’s other people’s
prejudice again that prevents the majority of narcolepsy sufferers from getting a foothold on
the career ladder- they can’t even get an interview in many cases- not even an initial one. You
can imagine how demoralizing this must be. And, in fact, the problem exists not just for
narcoleptics hoping to pursue a white-collar profession, but also for those seeking manual
work. Any job that requires a person to operate machinery will probably not be open to
narcoleptics- ostensibly for reasons of safety. And there’s another consequence of suffering
from this disorder-perhaps the one that the families of narcoleptics find most difficult to deal
with. Because narcoleptics have to keep as calm as possible-all the time- in order to avoid the
sudden loss of muscle control mentioned above – it may involve a personality change- and
this must be a hard thing indeed to bear.

II. The table below shows trends in captures of sea and ocean fish over a ten-year
period. Summarize the information by selecting and reporting the main features
and make comparisons where relevant.

Marine fish: total capture (thousand metric tonnes)

1989-1991 1999-2001
Asia, excluding Middle East 25,247 28,102
Europe 18,032 14,315
Middle East and North Africa 1,622 2,343
Sub-Saharan Africa 2,169 3,140
North America 5,069 3,995
Central America & Caribbean 1,445 1,377
South America 14,382 15,235
Oceania 602 944
Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

III. Write an essay of about 300-350 words on the following topic.

In many countries today, the eating habits and lifestyles of children are different from
those of previous generations. Some people say this has had a negative effect on their
health.

To what extent do you agree or disagree with this opinion?

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Give reasons for your answer and include any relevant examples from your own knowledge or
experience.

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