Đề thi chọn học sinh giỏi tỉnh Long An môn tiếng Anh lớp 12 – Vòng 1, bảng A (có đáp án)

A. LISTENING: (20 marks)
You will hear a short conversation. Each question in this part has four answer choices. Choose the correct answer(s). Write your answer(s) on your answer sheet.

1. What does the World Bank do? (Choose 1 answer)
(A) It saves seeds from plants all over the world.
(B) It gives money to the United Nations.
(C) It gives money, low interest loans, and interest-free credit to poor countries.
(D) It is part of the United Nations.

2. How does the professor explain that not everyone is rich? (Choose 2 answers)
(A) She compares how much money people in poor countries and rich countries make.
(B) She tells a story of poor people in Bolivia.
(C) She gives the example of how many children in poor countries cannot go to school.
(D) She defines wealth.

3. What is the talk mainly about? (Choose 1 answer)
(A) Parts of the World Bank
(B) The history of the World Bank
(C) What the World Bank does
(D) How the World Bank has changed

4. What reason is given for giving extra money to the poorest countries in 2002? (Choose 1 answer)
(A) To start new farms
(B) To build schools
(C) To recycle water
(D) To help fight the illness AIDS

B. READING & WRITING: (80 marks)

I. Read the passage and answer the questions that follow. (15 marks)

Steve grew up in a children’s home in Scotland. Every week, the staff took a proportion of the children’s pocket money to pay for holidays. Little Steve developed a daring strategy to hang on to what little money he had. He laughs about it now. “I used to swallow all my coins. That got them really furious, so they’d put me in a room on my own as a punishment. After a few minutes in there, I’d hit myself on the chest and cough the money back up.”

Since then, Steve has turned into Steve Starr, a professional regurgitator who does up to four shows a day, and can demand fees of $500-$2,000 a show.

Everything Steve swallows comes back dry, except for the goldfish. They swim about in his stomach in the water that he swallows for them first. After ten minutes they resume their normal lives in a goldfish bowl. “They never die”, says Steve.

Medical experts might have a few worries about Steve. The sight and sound of him swallowing and bringing back a snooker ball sometimes causes even normally calm people to panic. He also smokes a cigarette, retains the smoke in his stomach, then swallows some butane gas and mixes the two. Next he swallows some washing-up liquid, blows a huge bubble, brings up the smoke and gas inside the bubble, cuts the bubble off, gets someone to set light to it, and bang!

Physically, Steve doesn’t believe he is any different from the rest of the human race, who use their stomachs simply to digest food. “It’s all done by muscle control”, he says. “I imagine a little pair of hands in there doing everything, controlled by my brain. I’m sure I could teach anyone to do what I do”.

1. Why was Steve punished in the children’s home?
2. What does the sentence “Steve grew up in a children’s home” tell you about Steve’s early childhood?
3. What does the sentence “They’d put me in a room on my own as a punishment” tell you about the children’s home?
4. Why does the bubble go bang when someone sets light to it?
5. What, according to Steve, is the secret of his skill?

II. Read the following passage and then choose the best answer (A, B, C or D) to complete each of the numbered blanks. (15 marks)

THE LANGUAGE OF TEARS

The ability to weep is a uniquely human form of emotional response. Some scientists have suggested that human tears are evidence of an aquatic past – but this does not seem very likely. We cry from the moment we enter this (1) _________ for a number of reasons.

Helpless babies cry to (2) _________ their parents that they are ill, hungry or uncomfortable. As they (3) _________ they will also cry just to attract parental attention and will often stop when they get it.

The idea that (4) _________ a good cry can do you (5) _________ is a very old one and now it has scientific (6) _________ since recent research into tears has shown that they (7) _________ a natural painkiller called enkaphalin. By (8) _________ sorrow and pain this chemical helps you to feel better. Weeping can increase the quantities of enkaphalin you (9) _________.

Unfortunately, in our society we impose restrictions upon this naturally (10) _________ activity. Because some people still regard it as a (11) _________ of weakness in men, boys in particular are admonished when they cry. This kind of repression can only increase stress, both emotionally and physically.

Tears of emotion also help the body (12) _________ itself of toxic chemical (13) _________, for there is more protein in them than in tears resulting from cold winds or other irritants. Crying comforts, calms and can be very enjoyable – (14) _________ the popularity of the highly emotional films which are commonly (15) _________ “weepies”. It seems that people enjoy crying together almost as much as laughing together.

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