Thời gian làm bài: 150 phút (không kể thời gian phát đề)

ĐỀ THI CHÍNH THỨC VÀ BÀI LÀM

(Đề thi có 20 trang, gồm 50 câu và 1 bài viết luận)
Ngày thi: 19/7/2020
LISTENING COMPREHENSION (2pts)
(Instructions: Listen to the recording and answer the questions. You will hear each part of the
recording TWICE) Now turn to Section 1
SECTION 1: You will hear a woman talking on the phone to a hotel receptionist. First you
have some time to look at questions 1 to 5. You will see that there’s an example that has been
done for you. On this occasion only, the conversation relating to this will be played first.
Complete the form

Now listen and answer questions 6 to 10:

Now turn to section 2

SECTION 2: You will hear someone talking about the wildlife park. Before you listen you
have some time to look at questions 11 to 13

Now turn to section 3

SECTION 3: You will hear two students giving the results from the survey they conducted.

QUESTIONS 17-18: Choose the word whose STRESS differs from the other three in each of
the following questions (0.5 pt).

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Question 17: A. company B. competence C. component D. compromise
Question 18: A. molecular B. preference C. preliminary D. spontaneous
QUESTIONS 19-20: Choose the word whose underlined part differs from the other three in
PRONUNCIATION in each of the following questions (0.5 pt).
Question 19: A. evolve B. golf C. solve D. wolf
Question 20: A. composite B. opposite C. parasite D. requisite
QUESTIONS 21-22: Choose the word that is of different TOPIC or PART OF SPEECH from
the others in each of the following questions (0.5 pt).
Question 21: A. meager B. render C. slither D. wither
Question 22: A. calves B. chicks C. kittens D. pups
QUESTIONS 23-24: Complete the passage with the correct form of the words given in the
brackets. There is an example provided (0.5 pt).
There is no airport in the (0. LOCAL) ____locality ____ .
Question 23. It is difficult to find staff with the level of (EXPERT) __________ required for this
job.
Question 24. There may be a lot of precious stones on Mars. The photos of the black (SPARK)
__________ spots might be traces of gemstones.
QUESTIONS 25-26: Complete the passage with the correct tense of the verbs given in the
brackets (0.5 pt).
Question 25: The train (be) __________ late three times this week.
Question 26: Ring me tomorrow as soon as you (hear) __________ any news.
QUESTIONS 27-30: Match each half-sentence in COLUMN A with its suitable one in
COLUMN B to make a complete sentence. There are two left out (1.0 pt).
A B
Question 27: The woman asked me what A. when there will be a full moon next week.
Question 28: There will be high tide B. when did you begin studying English.
Question 29: The man tells me C. they behave there.
Question 30: Language center regulations govern how D. learners to learn English effectively.
E. , which is caused by the moon pulling the earth so hard.
F. aspect of learning English I found most difficult.
QUESTIONS 31-38: Read the passage and choose the correct answer to each of the questions
below (1.0 pt).
A.    Pity the poor British professor. Once upon a time in the halcyon 1960s, his students were
a privileged few, an academic elite drawn from the top four per cent of the population. New
university arrivals were literate and numerate; crimes against grammar were the exception rather
than the rule. According to a new comprehensive survey of British university faculty and staff, all
that has changed. "They, incoming students, don't know how to write essays they just assemble
bits from the Internet," commented a disgruntled Oxford tutor. Even the cream of candidates
do not necessarily know how to use an apostrophe," added another.
B.    The decline in student competence parallels a dramatic increase in British university and
college enrolment over the past decade, spurred in recent years by Prime Minister Tony Blair's
push to get half of all young Britons a university degree. As professors and business owners alike
decry the quality of university students and graduates, more than a few observers are questioning
the wisdom of packing ivory towers with the masses. Students themselves may begin to
question whether higher education is overvalued, with tuition rates set to rise steeply next fall.

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C.    British universities and colleges are teeming with almost 2.5 million young adults, a
12- fold increase of 1960s numbers, and up almost fifty per cent over the past decade alone. A
report published last month for the Association of Graduate Recruiters found that almost half of
the top 200 employers of university graduates were unhappy with the calibre of candidates.
The recent survey, conducted by Oxford University and Universities & Colleges Admissions
Service (UCAS), listed a catalogue of complaints about freshmen which had led in some cases to
year long courses being deferred by a year.

D.    "You are getting students going to higher education now who wouldn't have done so 20
years ago, and in some ways that's a good thing, as it widens opportunity," says Geoff
Hayward, lecturer at Oxford University’s educational studies department. There were, he adds,
"genuine concerns about young people and their capacity to benefit from higher education". Part
of the problem, Mr. Hayward says, lies in the way teenagers are taught in school, prepped
assiduously for exams at the expense of broader understanding. Despite the students' academic
failings, the Oxford/UCAS survey did find they were more tech-savvy and better at oral
communication than their predecessors.

E.    Nevertheless, concerns about the state of Britain's university system are deepening this year
as its funding faces one of its biggest shake-ups in decades. Following the lead of America,
Australia, and New Zealand among others, universities will introduce a new annual £3,000
($6,000) tuition fee for students next year - nearly triple the current fee. The charge, brought in by
the government to drum up cash for a perennially under-funded sector, is expected to saddle
graduates with debts of at least £12,000 ($24,000), according to the National Union of Students
(NUS), making some think twice about whether to study. Already, official figures show the
number of university applicants fell this year for the first time in six years, by 3.4 per cent.

F.    "We've said all along that this policy will deter prospective students from going to
university," says Julian Nicholds, NUS vice president for education. "About 13,000 fewer
prospective students have applied this year, and that is only attributable to the threat of debt in the
future." For the government, the fall in applicants is slightly awkward. Tony Blair's Labour
administration has committed itself to boosting the number of young people in higher education to
fifty per cent by 2010. That might prove tricky if teenagers - and their parents - are deterred by
the burgeoning cost of study.

G.    Alison Wolf, an expert at King's College London and author of a book called "Does
Education Matter," concedes that the added fees might make students think twice but says the
price increase won't turn them away. "When a degree has become as important as ours, all the
evidence is that fees will not have an impact because it's still economically worthwhile to get a
degree," says Ms. Wolf. Estimates suggest graduates will still earn as much as £400,000
($800,000) more over a lifetime than non- graduates: A little debt will be worth it in the long run,
she says.

H.    Bill Rammell, higher education minister, says Blair's target of fifty per cent enrolment is
"an economic and social necessity". He also points out that by 2012, an estimated 6.8 million
graduate jobs will have been created, requiring increasing numbers of university- educated
workers. "It is therefore crucial that we are able to produce sufficient numbers of highly skilled,
employable graduates to fill those posts," says Mr. Rammell. "Most industrialised countries have
targets to expand university numbers."

I.    However, Wolf says the government's fifty per cent target is "nuts". "There is no evidence that
it is important for economic growth," she contends. "Switzerland is the richest country in

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Europe and has one of the lowest numbers of graduates." A market based society, she says, is
capable of working out what kind of workers it needs without government-mandated quotas,
which may end up encouraging people to go to university who might do better pursuing
vocational endeavours. "It would make more sense for society if lots of people didn't go to
university for the wrong reasons," she says, "but as long as employers continue to use degrees as a
filter device for screening candidates, demand for degrees will remain high."
(Extract from IELTS, Cambridge University Press)
Question 31: What does the passage mainly discuss?
A. British universities seek quantity and quality
B. Fees are higher and many British employers are unhappy
C. Britain says paying is worth it while Switzerland announces the opposite.
D. British Government’s push for numbers of university graduates
Question 32: According to the information given in the passage, university students nowadays
are criticized for their lack of ______ ?
A. Theatrical ability B. Composition writing ability
C. Criminal behaviour D. IT know-how
Question 33: In “more than a few observers are questioning the wisdom of packing ivory towers
with the masses”, what could the phrase “packing ivory towers with the masses” be closest in
meaning with?
A. building massive towers with ivory from elephant tusks
B. demanding far-from-practical things in large numbers
C. producing fewer university-educated personnel with higher quality
D. overvaluing higher education
Question 34: Geoff Hayward is concerned about?
A. The quantity of students B. The profits from higher education
C. Too much focus on examinations at schools
D. The ability of students to communicate properly
Question 35: In “That might prove tricky if teenagers - and their parents - are deterred by
the burgeoning cost of study”, the word “burgeoning” can be best replaced with ______ .
A. escalating B. de-escalating C. dwindling D. diminishing
Question 36: Bill Rammel points out that ______ .
A. Britain does not have enough graduates B. There are 6.8 million graduates in Britain
C. Other countries want to decrease the number of graduates
D. Most universities in countries aim to expand industries
Question 37: Wolf believes______ .
A. The number of university graduates is definitely crucial for economic growth
B. Switzerland is better than Britain. C. Government-mandated quotas are required
D. Market forces should determine how many people go to university.
Question 38: According to the information given in the passage, which TWO (2) of the
following statements (from i to viii) are NOT TRUE?

i. Higher education is overvalued.

ii. Certain students have had to postpone taking courses.
iii. Students nowadays are better at using technology.
iv. The number of university applications has declined this year.
v. The government wants 50% of young people in higher education.
vi. Alison Wolf agrees with Julian Nicholds.
vii. Bill Rammell agrees with Tony Blair.

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viii. Switzerland is following Britain’s example.

A. i, iii B. ii, iv C. v, vii D. iv, vi E. vi, viii

QUESTIONS 39-46: Read the passage and fill in ONE suitable word for each blank (1.0 pt).
The Mother of All Languages
In 1786, William Jones, a British judge stationed in India, made what must be ranked as one of the
most amazing discoveries of all time, yet it is little known outside of linguistic circles. Jones was
studying Sanskrit, a long dead Indian language only used in classic or liturgical texts.
Upon examining many of the words, he was struck by their similarity to the two most ancient
languages known at that time: Greek and Latin. He would later write that Sanskrit has ‘a stronger
affinity’ with these other languages ‘than could possibly have been produced by accident’.
Jones drew the (39)_________ that Greek and Latin, and even the Germanic languages (including
English), were all related to Sanskrit, and thus, logically, all of them must necessarily have
evolved from a single earlier language. Subsequent scholars were able to confirm this, adding to
this linguistic family all of the Romance languages (French, Spanish, and others), Slavic
languages (Russian, Czech, and many others), and Indo-lranian (Persian, Afghan, and many
others). There are, in fact, hundreds of languages and dialects all over Europe, Iran, and South
Asia, which can now trace their ancestry to an original Indo-European language, now called
Proto-Indo-European, or PIE for short.

According to linguistic theory, proto-languages are usually spoken over relatively limited
geographical areas, over a short time span, and by a tightly-knit community. The implication
is simple, but also stunning that some single ancient tribe which spoke this mother of
languages eventually took over most of the middle and western Eurasian landmass, spreading
their language with them. This subsequently evolved into many others over the course of time,
(40)__________ a language family which now has the greatest number of speakers in the world.
The big question concerns who these Proto-Indo-Europeans were, and where their ancestral
homeland lay.

Archaeologists have examined many sites of European prehistory, occasionally identifying these
as the homeland of the PIE population. This is often done with nationalistic overtones, raising
the anger of others in this field, and there still remains controversy over each (41)_________. It is
linguistic evidence which provides, perhaps, more definite clues. The similarities in vocabulary
between all PIE’s daughter languages have allowed linguists to deduce a probable grammar and
fairly extensive vocabulary. It is irresistible not to read into this a tentative lifestyle and location,
with the quaint proviso that it remains ‘at best, highly speculative’.
Looking at just one example, there are PIE words for the temperate trees of the Northern
Hemisphere, but not tropical or Mediterranean varieties. This indicates a northern
European location, with a cold climate. And so, with such detailed linguistic (42)_________, the
most widely accepted theory places the PIE origin in the Caspian Steppe - a vast region of
temperate grass and shrub-land north of the Black Sea, across present-day Ukraine, Southern
Russia, and Kazakhstan. Their language was spoken around 4000 BC (plus or minus a
millennium, since exact dates are impossible at such an early stage in European pre-history).

What then enabled this single tribe to advance outwards and take over Eurasia? Some geneticists
have suggested that it was the domestication of the horse, perhaps giving that tribe a
thitherto unheard-of military (43)__________ (as would the Huns and the Mongols possess many
thousands of years later). Some of them have also suggested that the discovery of farming was the

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impetus of this tribe’s advance, as with a stable and steady food supply at hand, their numbers
could increase at the (44) _________ of the other fragmented hunter-gathering tribes roaming the
wilds of Eurasia. Perhaps then, PIE simply moved alongside the outward wave of the
implementation of agriculture, together with a rapidly expanding and interbreeding population.
But even PIE must have evolved from some earlier language, and audacious linguists are
digging deeper into the past. PIE gave birth to a large family of languages, but there exists other
families, such as Afro-Asiatic (which includes Arabic), Dravidian (comprising the many
languages of Southern India), and Altaic (which includes Mongolian and Japanese). It has been
proposed that these themselves may all belong to a ‘macro-family’, sometimes called Proto-
Nostratic. Most linguists maintain that, although it is theoretically possible that such an original
language existed, it is next to impossible to prove, since resemblances among languages can also
be due to chance, and thus they remain (45)_________ over such a claim.

Still, the implications are mind-boggling that perhaps almost every single language on Earth can
ultimately be traced back to a single source possessed by a small group of individuals.
This language is sometimes called Proto-Human, the mother of all languages. One interesting
theory posited by geologists is that a huge catastrophe occurred in the not-so-distant past some
70,000 years ago, linked to the volcanic eruption of Mount Toba in Indonesia. This reduced the
world population to a small band of survivors, and theirs is the Proto-Human from which all
languages (46)_________ evolved. If this is true, it is intriguing to think that had that catastrophe
not occurred, we would all be speaking totally different languages today.
(From IELTS book)
QUESTIONS 47-50: Rewrite these sentences, beginning with the words given in such a way
that their meaning will not change (1.0 pt).
Question 47: A tornado looks like a funnel.-->
🡪 A tornado and a funnel __________________.
Question 48: The eruption of Pinatubo is the world’s largest ever volcanic eruption.
🡪 The world has _________________________________________.
Question 49: We are still trying to decide on a venue.
🡪 We are still trying to make _______________________________.
Question 50: Who wrote “Hamlet”?
🡪 By ________________.
WRITING AN ESSAY (1.5 pts)
Write about the following topic:
Modern forms of communication such as email, messaging or social networking webpages
have greatly affected young people’s lives. What are the advantages and disadvantages of
this change?
Give comments and include any relevant examples from your knowledge or experience.
Write 200 – 250 words.

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