Integrated Skills in English

ISE II
The Controlled Written examination
Saturday 19 January 2008

10.00am12.00pm

Your full name:

(BLOCK CAPITALS)

Candidate registration number:

Centre:
Time allowed: 2 hours
Instructions to candidates
1. Write your name, candidate number and centre number on the front of this examination paper.
2. You must not open this examination paper until instructed to do so.
3. This examination paper contains two tasks. You must complete both tasks.
4. Use blue or black pen, not pencil.
5. Write your answers on the examination paper.
6. Do all rough work on the examination paper. Cross through any work you do not want marked.
7. You must not use a dictionary in this examination.
8. You must not use correction fluid on the examination paper.

Information for candidates

The tasks in this examination have equal weighting.
You are advised to spend about 60 minutes on Task 1 and about 60 minutes on Task 2.
Examiners use only
Task 1
Task fulfilment

Accuracy and range

Task fulfilment

Accuracy and range

Task 2

ISEII0108

ISE II

19 January 2008

Integrated Skills in English II

Time allowed: 2 hours
This examination paper contains two tasks. You must complete both tasks.

Task 1 Reading into writing task

Read the text below Then, in your own words, write a report (approximately 250 words) for a group
of Human Resources managers:
i) summarising the new procedures that Google is using to recruit staff and
ii) saying what you think are the advantages and disadvantages of this method compared with
a traditional interview.

What does your pet tell us about you?

It used to be true that specific skills and experience would help you find that perfect job. Not
now: in a competitive and psychologically aware world, there are other personality
characteristics that matter more such as what pets you have!
Pressured by competition and their own success, the popular search engine Google has created
an automated way to search for new employees who are fully appropriate as well as
academically high-achieving.
In a pilot project, the 100,000 people who fill in online job applications for Google each month
will be asked to complete a complicated questionnaire exploring their attitudes, behaviour,
personality and biographical details going back to their school days.
The questions range from whether applicants have ever set a world record, to whether their
workspace is messy or tidy or what magazines they subscribe to. Answers are studied by
Googles mathematicians to calculate a score meant to predict how well a person will fit into
the organisations chaotic and competitive culture.
Psychometric tests are already used by more traditional companies to select workers, but they
are unheard of in a company like Google, which is built on a belief in individual talent. The
online questionnaire is based on the answers to 300 questions sent out last summer to every
employee at the head office in Californias Silicon Valley. Some questions were factual: What
programming languages are you familiar with? What internet mailing lists do you subscribe to?
Other questions, however, tried to establish personality and behavioural characteristics: Have
you ever tutored another person?
We wanted to cast a very wide net, said Laszlo Bock, Googles Vice-President for People
Operations. It is not unusual to walk into our office and bump into dogs. Maybe people who
own dogs have some personality trait that is useful.
(Source: Adapted from The Observer, 7 January 2007)

Use your own words as far as possible. No marks for answers copied from the reading texts.
page 2

This examination paper contains two tasks. You must complete both tasks.

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Task 2 Writing task

It is better for children to grow up in the countryside than in a big city.
Write an article (approximately 250 words) for a lifestyle magazine, saying to what extent you agree
or disagree with this statement, supporting your viewpoint with relevant examples.

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End of examination
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