PART 2: GRAMMAR FOCUS

Lexical Word Form

Word form is a set of words that share the same properties and functions. In English

language, there are four major word forms. The table below shows four different

categories of words.

WORD FUNCTION EXAMPLES

FORM
Noun Refers to people, thing, animal, student, smartphone, leopard,

place, qualities, ideas and faculty, happiness,

activities determination, fishing, etc.

Adjective Refers to words that describe manageable, decent, effective,

nouns or pronouns jovial, comprehensive, etc.

Verb Refers to actions, experiences perform, comprehend, think,

or states of being believe, trust, appear, seem,

etc.

Adverb Refers to words that describe efficiently, drastically, quite,

verbs, adjectives or another always, sometimes, recently,

adverbs etc.

Some words can be in more than one category. While the form is changed, the

meaning is generally still the same.

1 Happy (Adjective) Happily (Adverb) Feeling, showing, or causing

pleasure or satisfaction

2 Determine (Verb) Determination (Noun) To control or influence

something directly, or to decide

what will happen

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 3 Effect (Noun) Effective (Adjective) The result of a particular

influence

4 Dreadfully (Adverb) Dread (Verb) To feel extremely worried or

frightened about something

that is going to happen or that

might happen

Subject-Verb Agreement

Paraphrasing sometimes requires the readers to rewrite the sentence in a different

organisation. When reorganising a sentence, it is important to make sure that the

sentence is grammatically correct. One aspect of grammar that needs to be considered

in paraphrasing is subject-verb agreement.

In English, sentences are made of at least one subject-verb pair. The subject(s)

and verb(s) in a sentence must agree with one another in number. If the subject

is singular, the verb must also be in singular form and vice versa.

Example:

singular subject singular verb

Malaysia is one of the developing countries.

singular subject singular verb (with ‘s’)

Malaysia consists of fourteen states.

compound subject plural verb (without ‘s’)

Malaysia and other Asian countries establish a diplomatic relationship.

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Practice 7

Fill in the blanks with the suitable verb.

1. Nelson Mandela ________ (share) his vision with undergraduate students at

Waseda University’s School of Education in Tokyo.

2. A 21-years-old student ________ (lead) a revolutionary project in e- education

where internet is used for the first time in Bangladesh for virtual learning.

3. The children of poor families in the villages ________ (be) at a disadvantage

in their preparation for the university entrance exam.

4. Saisho and his team ________ (observe) that the same phenomenon of poverty has
also been earlier reported by other researchers.

5. Ekhlaspur, a small farming village with a population of 5000, ________ (be) a three-
hour boat ride south on the Meghna River from Bangladesh, Dhaka.

Practice 8

Before Reading

Previewing and predicting the text

1. Read the title and the first sentence of each paragraph in the reading text. Tick (√)

each topic you think will be discussed in the text.

Explanation of noise pollution

How noise pollution impacts on humans’ hearing

Types of health issues

How to maintain healthy

The connection of noise pollution and cardiovascular diseases

Ways to overcome noise pollution

What do you think this text will be about?

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 Noise Pollution

I Nowadays, we are very used to the loud sounds made by

household appliances, the television, people talking on their phone, and

the traffic. This is because they have become a part of the urban culture,

thus rarely disturb us. However, when these sounds keep you from

sleeping at night or give you a headache, they stop becoming just noises 5

and start turning into noise pollution. When this condition occurs

frequently, it tends to affect our health.

II The first effect of noise pollution on health is it can cause hearing

problem. Constant exposure to high levels of noise can easily damage the
10
ear drums. Even though humans’ hearing is capable of receiving sound

waves, but it has a certain limit. When it exceeds the limit, it can cause

problems within the body. Noises from machineries, airplanes and trains

can be too loud for our hearing range. Sometimes, exposure to loud

noises over a long period of time can cause temporary hearing loss which
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fortunately will heal itself if given time to recover. However, this can lead

to a more serious damage which is permanent loss of hearing. Studies

have shown that people of all ages have hearing loss in one or both ears

from exposure to loud noises.

III Secondly, noise pollution can cause sleep disorder. Our ears are 20

extremely sensitive. It is still working even when we sleep because it is a

permanently open auditory channel. Sounds are transmitted to our ears

and then interpreted by different parts of the brain. We may not be aware

of it, but noises produced even in our homes will be received by our ears

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 continuously. Moreover, these noises travel to all parts of the body and

affect everything from heart rate to blood pressure which will lead to 25

insomnia. Studies have shown that these noises can lead to other health

issues such as stress, fatigue and hypertension.

IV Besides that, noise pollution can increase the risk of

cardiovascular diseases. Researchers have been studying the connection

30
between noise pollution and cardiovascular disease for a long time. They

have found that exposure to loud noises on a regular basis can result in

high blood pressure, stroke, and even heart failure. This is because high

intensity noise disrupts the body at cellular level which will trigger the

stress response in our brain and activates our body’s nervous system. 35

Such strong noises can force the body to release a surge of hormones

including adrenaline and cortisol which can cause our arteries to constrict

and eventually lead to vascular damage.

V In conclusion, noise pollution is a serious matter that can

negatively affect our lives as it can cause hearing problems, sleep 40

disorder and cardiovascular diseases. Perhaps it is difficult to find a single

effective solution to combat noise pollution, but small step can be taken

at personal level. Each one of us can help by reducing the amount of noise

that we produce daily such as by lowering the volume of the radio,

television and other household appliances. This issue can only be

successfully resolved if we understand our role in causing such pollution

and then take the steps to overcome it.

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Practice 9
Answer the following questions.

1. How does noise pollution cause the hearing impairment?

[type the answer here]

2. What are the other two effects of noise pollution on humans’ health?

[type the answer here]

3. What is the writer’s purpose of writing about noise pollution?

[type the answer here]

4. “This is because it has become a part of the urban culture, thus rarely disturbs

us.”

From the sentence above, how would you describe the city dwellers’

perception on loud noise?

[type the answer here]

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5. Using contextual clues, find the meanings of the words taken from the text Noise

Pollution.

Words Meanings Clues from the text

temporary

(line 14) [type the answer here] [type the answer here]

transmitted

(line 21) [type the answer here] [type the answer here]

intensity

(line 33) [type the answer here] [type the answer here]

6. What are the words or phrases that the following pronouns refer to in the

passage?

it (line 11) [type the answer here]

this (line 15) [type the answer here]

They (line 30) [type the answer here]

7. Write the main idea for each of the following paragraphs in a complete sentence.

Paragraph Main Idea

II
[type the answer here]
III
[type the answer here]
IV
[type the answer here]

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8. Paraphrase the main ideas in question 7.

Paragraph Paraphrased
sentence
II
[type the answer here]
III
[type the answer here]
IV
[type the answer here]

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