Vol 4 Test 4
Vol 4 Test 4
READING PASSAGE 1
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading
Passage 1 on pages 2 and 3.
Multiple intelligences
The implications of multiple intelligence theory for teachers
The first intelligence test was developed in France by Alfred Binet early in the
20century. By the 1920s and 1930, intelligence tests and their product, an individual's
IQ (Intelligence Quotient), had become widely used in many societies around the
world. Tests of this type, however, have now fallen into disrepute. All they test is
linguistic and logical- mathematical intelligence and this traditional definition of
intelligence is now regarded as too narrow. We now know that 75% of teachers are
sequential, analytical presenters but 70% of students do not actually learn this way. A
number of investigators now believe that the mind consists of several independent
modules or intelligences. The educational psychologist most responsible for this
change of attitude is Howard Gardner, professor of education at Harvard University in
the United States and the creator of the Multiple intelligence theory.
Gardner also speculates on the possibility of there being both a spiritual intelligence
and an existential intelligence but comes to no definite conclusions.
Following are some characteristics of the different intelligences, along with ways to
exercise and develop them:
Linguistic intelligence:
Involves reading, writing, speaking, and conversing in one's own or foreign languages.
It may be exercised through reading interesting books, listening to recordings, using
various kinds of computer technology, and actively participating in discussion.
Logical-mathematical intelligence:
Involves number and computing skills, developing an awareness of patterns, and the
ability to solve different kinds of problems through logic. It may be exercised through
playing number and logic games, and solving various kinds of puzzles.
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Musical intelligence:
Involves understanding and expressing oneself through music and rhythmic
movements or dance. It may be exercised through exposure to a variety of
recordings, engaging in rhythmic activities, and singing, dancing, or playing various
instruments.
Spatial intelligence:
Involves the ability to create and manipulate mental images, and the orientation of
the body in space. It may be developed through sharpening observation skills, solving
mazes and other spatial tasks, and using imagery and active imagination.
Intrapersonal intelligence:
Involves comprehending our emotions, and growing in the ability to control and work
with them consciously. It may be exercised through participating in independent
projects, journal-writing, and finding quiet places for reflection.
Gardner proposes that the eight intelligences he has identified are independent, in
that they develop at different times and to different degrees in different individuals.
They are, however, closely related, and many teachers and parents are finding that
when an individual develops proficiency in one area, the whole constellation of
intelligences may be enhanced.
Does the fact that we each have a unique profile mean that teachers should plan
individual lessons for every student in the class to talk this into account? Clearly, this
would be impractical and the solution lies in including classroom activities designed to
appeal to each of the intelligence types.
Gardner suggests that the challenge of the coming decades is to stop treating
everyone in a uniform way. He proposes individually configured education-an
education that takes individual differences seriously and creates practices that serve
different kinds of minds equally well.
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Questions 1-4
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1 ?
In boxes 1-4 on your answer sheet, write
TRUE if the statement agrees with the information
FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
Questions 5-10
Question 11-13
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READING PASSAGE 2
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14-26, which are based on Reading
passage on pages 7 and 8.
Question 14-19
List of Headings
14 Paragraph A
15 Paragraph B
16 Paragraph C
17 Paragraph D
18 Paragraph E
19 Paragraph F
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A unique golden textile
A two-man project to use spider silk is achieved after 4 years
A
A rare textile made from the silk of more than a million wild spiders has been on
display at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. To produce this
golden cloth, 70 people spent four years collecting golden orb spiders from telephone
poles in Madagascar, while another dozen workers carefully extracted about 80 feet of
silk filament from each of the arachnids. The resulting 11-foot by 4-foot textile is the
only large piece of cloth made from natural spider silk existing in the world today.
B
Spider silk is very elastic and strong compared with steel or Kevlar, said textile expert
Silom Peers, who co-led the project. Kevlar is a lightweight synthetic fabric which is
chemically related to nylon. It is very tough and durable and used in bullet-proof vest.
Kevlar is also resistant to wear, tear, and heat and has absolutely no melting point.
But the tensile strength of spider silk is even greater than Kevlar's aramid filaments,
and greater than that of high-grade steel. Most importantly, spider silk is extremely
lightweight: a strand of spider silk long enough to circle the Earth would weigh less
than 500 grams (18 oz). Spider silk is also especially ductile, able to stretch up to 140
per cent of its length without breaking. It can hold its strength below-40c. This gives it
a very high toughness, which equals that of commercial fibers.
C
Researchers have long been intrigued by the unique properties of spider silk.
Unfortunately, spider silk is extremely hard to mass produce. Unlike silk worms, which
are easy to raise in captivity, spiders have a habit of chomping off each other's heads
when housed together. According to Peers, there's scientific research going on all over
the world right now trying to replicate the tensile properties of spider silk a apply it to
all sorts of areas in medicine and industry, but no one up until now has succeeded in
replicating 100 per cent of the properties of natural spider silk.
D
Peers came up with the idea of weaving spider silk after learning about the French
missionary Jacob Paul Camboue, who worked with spiders in Madagascar during the
1880s and 1890s. Camboue built a small, hand-driven machine to extract silk from up
to 24 spiders at once, without harming them. The spiders were temporarily restrainer
their silk extracted, and then let go, Peers managed to build a replica of this 24-spider
silking machine that was used at the turn of the century, said Nicholas Godley, who
co- led the project with Peers. As an experiment, the pair collected an initial batch of
about 20 spiders. When we stuck them in the machine and started turning it, lo and
behold, this beautiful gold-colored silk started coming out', Godley said.
E
But to make a textile of any significant size, the silk experts had to drastically scale up
their plan. Fourteen thousand spiders yield about an ounce of silk, Godley said, and
the textile weighs about 2.6 pounds. The numbers are overwhelming. To get as much
silk as they needed, Godley and Peers began hiring dozens of spider handlers to
collect wild arachnids and carefully harness them to the silk-extraction machine. We
had to find people who were willing to work with spiders, Godley said, because they
bite' By the end of the project, Godley and Peers extracted silk from more than 1
million female golden orb spiders, which are abundant throughout Madagascar and
known for the rich golden color of their silk, Because the spiders only produce silk
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during the rainy season, workers collected all the spiders between October and June.
Then an additional 12 people used hand-powered machines to extract the silk and
where it into 96-filament thread. Once the spiders had been silked, they were
released back into the wild, where Godley said it takes them about a week to
regenerate their skill. We can go back and re-silk the same spiders, he said. It's like
the gift that never stops giving.
F
Of course, spending four years to produce a single textile of spider silk isn't very
practical for scientists trying to study the properties of spider silk, or companies that
want to manufacture the fabric for the use as a biomedical product, or an alternative
to Kevlar armor. Several groups have tried inserting spider genes into bacteria or
even cows and goats to produce silk, but so far, the attempts have been only
moderately successful. Part of the reason it's so hard to generate spider silk in the lab
is that it starts out as a liquid protein that's produced by a special gland in the spider's
abdomen. Using their spinneret, spiders apply force to rearrange the protein's
molecular structure and transform it into solid silk. When we talk about a spider
spinning silk, we're talking about how the spider applies forces to produce a
transformation from liquid to solid, said spider silk expert Todd Blackledge of the
University of Akron, Ohio, US, who was not involved in creating the textile. Scientists
simply can't replicate the efficiency with which a spider produces silk. Every year
we're getting closer and closer to being able to mass-produce it, but we're not there
yet. For now, it seems we'll have to be content with one incredibly beautiful cloth,
graciously provided by more than a million spiders.
Questions 20-23
Look at the following statements (Questions 20-23) and the list of researchers below
Match each statement with the correct researcher, A,B or C
Write the correct letter A, B or C in boxes 20-23 on your answer sheet
NB You may use any letter more than once
List of Researchers
A Simon Peers
B Nicholas Godley
C Todd Blackledge
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Questions 24-26
Both scientists and manufacturers are interested in producing silk for many different
purposes. Some researchers have tried to grow silk by introducing genetic material
into 24 _________ and some animals. But these experiments have been somewhat
disappointing.
It is difficult to make spider silk in a lab setting because the silk comes from a liquid
protein made in a 25 __________ inside the spider’s body. When a spider spins silk, it
causes a 26 __________ that turns this liquid into solid silk. Scientists cannot replicate
this yet.
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READING PASSAGE 3
You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27-40,which are based on Reading
Passage 3 on page 10 and 11.
Some scientists peer at things through high-powered telescopes, others tempt rats
through mazes, or mix bubbling fluids in glass beakers. Then there is Robert Cialdini,
whose unorthodox research involves such mundane items as towels and chocolates.
Nonetheless, Cialdini believes he is discovering important insights into how society
works, because he is donducting research into why some people are more persuasive
than others.
Cialdini hopes that, by applying a little science, we should all be able to get our own
way more often. This is in part a personal quest with its origins in his own experience:
Cialdini claims that for his whole life he has been easy prey for salespeople and
fundraisers who have managed to persuade him to buy things he did not want or give
to charities he had never heard of.
Experiments on the psychology of persuasion were telling only a part of the story,
Cialdini began to probe influence in the real world, enrolling in sales-training
programmes. In this way, he believes he learned first hand a great deal about how to
sell automobiles from a car lot, insurance from an office, and even encyclopaedias
door to door. Most recently his research has involved the now famous experiments
with towels. Many hotels leave a little card in each bathroom asking guests to reuse
towels and thus conserve water and reduce pollution. Cialdini and his colleagues
wanted to test the relative effectiveness of different text on those cards. Could hotels
best motivate their guests to co-operate simply because it would help save the planet,
or were other factors more compelling?
To test this, the researchers redesigned the cards, replacing the environmental
message with the simple (and truthful) statement tha the majority of guests at the
hotel had reused their towel at least once. Those guests who received this message
were found to be 26% more likely to reuse their towel than those given the original
message, and 74% more likely than those receiving no message at all.
This was just one study that has enabled Cialdini to identify his Six Principles of
Persuasion. The phenomenon revealed by the towel experiment he calls "social
proof": the idea that our decisions are influenced by what other people like us are
doing. More perniciously, social proof is the force underpinning some people's anxiety
not to be left behind by their neighhours, thus the desire for a bigger house or a faster
car. Afurther principle, which he names "reciprocity”, was tested in a restaurant by
measuring how patrons would respond to after-dinner chocolates. When the
chocolates were dropped individually in front of each diner, tips went up 14%. This is
reciprocity in action: we want to return favours done to us, often without bothering to
accurately calculate whether what we are giving is proportionate to what we have
received.
Cialdini's research has established four more such principles. 'Searcity' is the idea that
people want more of things they can have less of, a notion that advertisers ruthlessly
exploit-limit of four per customer", Parents can also make use of scarcity by telling
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their little ones that this is a very unusual chance so they should seize it immediately.
The principle of 'authority' states that we trust people who know what they are talking
about. Cialdini maintains that many professionals don't display their credentials,
fearing it is bastful or arrogant to publicise their expertise. The principle he labels
'consistency' suggests that we want to act in ways that are consistent with
undertaking we have already made. For example, if you are soliciting charitable
donations, first ask colleagues if they think they will sponsor you. Later, return with a
sponsorship form to those who said yes and remind them of their earlier undertaking.
The final principle is 'likeness': we are more easily persuaded by those who seem
similar to ourselves. In one study, people were sent survey forms and asked to return
them to a named researcher. When the researcher falsely indentified herself (e.g
Cynthia Johnson is sent a survey by Cindy Johansen'), surveys were twice as likely to
be completed.
Many of Cialdini's claims about persuasion are just that- highly persuasive-and I can
readily see evidence for some of them in my own workplace. But Cialdini's
experiments were conducted in the United Stateds and I wonder how well all of his
findings can be applied here in New Zealand or elsewhere around the world. For
instance, I do understand the general principle of 'reciprocity' but cannot imagine New
Zealand waiting staff using his cynical chocolate trick in their restaurants because the
culture of tipping in this country is so different, But it is true that the way to a diner's
heart is to give them something they are not expecting in the way of service and in
this country reciprocation would more likely take the form of a return visit to the
restaurant and not a tip. It may be that age is also a factor and that different
generations would react differently to say, the 'consistency' principle. I suspect that
younger people in this country would respond quite positively to this sort of approach,
where as their parents might be put off by any hint of a hard sell. Perhaps in the end
we must accept that some of us are simply born with more persuasion skills than
others and that we have less control over such matters than Cialdini might like to
think.
Question 27-31
27 What point is the writer making about Robert Cialdini in the first paragraph?
A He wants to change the way society operates.
B He uses a wide variety of research techniques.
C He has an unconventional approach to this work.
D He refuses to make use of animals in his experiments.
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31 The results of the towel experiment suggest that guests
A were disinclined to tell the truth about towel use
B preferred not to receive a message with their towels
C were more receptive to messages about other guests.
D responded more positively to an environmental message
Questions 32-36
Cialdini's towel experiment demonstrated the principle he named' social proof, which
can result in competitive materialism. His research using chocolates suggests that
people don't always assess the 32 __________ of transaction. A further principle
recommends that advertisers and parents should claim that something is a 33
__________ in order to be more persuasive. The authority principle is often ignored
when some professionals are concerned their actions might be considered 34
________. He similarly suggests that people will give more to charity if they can be
reminded of 35 __________. Lastly, even something like a 36 __________ has been
shown to result in move surveys being completed.
Questions 37-40
Do the following statements agree with the views of the writer in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 37-40 on your answer sheet, write
YES if the statement agrees with the views of the writer
NO if the statement contradicts the views of the writer
NOT GIVEN if it is impossible to say what the writer thinks about this
37 The writer sees evidence of the reciprocity principle in his own family.
38 Persuasion may operate in different ways in different countries.
39 New Zealand diners are likely to leave tips if they are given chocolate.
40 Oder New Zealanders would be more attracted to consistency.
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