TRUE, FALSE, NOT GIVEN - IELTS Reading

Exercise 1

Read the text and answer the questions below.

The largest thing in the universe

More than ten years ago, while taking the temperature of the universe, astronomers found something
odd. They discovered that a patch of sky, spanning the width of 20 moons, was unusually cold.

The astronomers were measuring the thermal radiation that bathes the entire universe, a glowing relic
of the big bang. To gaze at this cosmic microwave background, or CMB , is to glimpse the
primordial1 universe, a time when it was less than 400,000 years old.

The CMB blankets the sky, and looks pretty much the same everywhere, existing at a feebly cold
temperature of 2.725 kelvins - just a couple degrees warmer than absolute zero. But armed with the
newly launched WMAP satellite, the astronomers had set out to probe temperature variations as tiny as
one part in 100,000. Born from the quantum froth that was the universe a half-moment after the big
bang, those random fluctuations help scientists understand what the cosmos is made of and how it all
came to be.

And standing out amidst those fluctuations was a cold spot. Over the years, astronomers have come up
with all sorts of ideas to explain it, ranging from instrumental error to parallel universes. But now,
they're homing in on a prime suspect: an enormous cavern of emptiness called a cosmic supervoid, so
big that it might be the largest structure in the universe.

According to theory, such a vast void, in which nary a star or galaxy exists, can leave a frigid imprint on
the CMB. The answer to the mystery, then, might simply be a whole lot of nothing. Yet puzzles remain,
and the case is far from closed.

Primordial1 - ancient, existing a very long time.

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?

In boxes 1–5, chose

TRUE                          if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE                        if the statement contradicts the information

NOT GIVEN                if there is no information on this

1 Astronomers often find something odd on the sky. _NG

2 The CMB is the thermal radiation across the entire universe. _T
3 The CMB varies from extremely low to very high temperatures. ___F__
4 Investigation of fluctuations of temperature in the space help scientists to understand what the
cosmos is made of.___T__
5 The cosmic supervoid is the largest structure in the universe. __NG__
Exercise 2

The hottest month

According to the Met Office, the UK had its warmest July day ever on July 1, when temperatures hit 36.7
C near London. There were record heat waves in many countries including Spain, while the African
continent had the second-warmest July on record.

While the impact of increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a key driver of rising
temperatures, another important factor is El Nino. This natural phenomenon, which appears as a large
swathe of warm water in the Pacific every few years, is known to push up global temperatures.
In recent days there have been reports that this year's El Nino will be particularly intense. As a result,
many experts believe that 2015 will be the warmest year on record by some margin.

The seas have also been soaking up a large amount of heat, the NOAA said, with record warming in large
expanses of the Pacific and Indian Oceans

Peter Stott, head of climate monitoring and attribution at the UK Met Office, said: "A strong El Nino is
under way in the tropical Pacific and this, combined with the long-term global warming trend, means
there is the potential to see some very warm months throughout this year - as the new figures for July
appear to show.

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?
In boxes 1-5, chose

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
 
1 Africa had the warmest July day ever on July 1 _F___

2 The temperature is rising due to the increased level of carbon dioxide in the
atmosphere. __T___                          

3 2015 might be the hottest year in the history. __T___

4 Record warming was recorded in various seas, such as Black and Azov Sea. __NG__

5 The year 2015 might very well consist of a number of very warm months. __T__
Exercise 3

Is there such a thing as Canadian English? If so, what is it?

The standard stereotype among Americans is that Canadians are like Americans, except they say ‘eh’ a
lot and pronounce ‘out and about’ as ‘oot and aboot’. Many Canadians, on the other hand, will tell you
that Canadian English is more like British English, and as proof will hold aloft the spellings colour and
centre and the name zed for the letter Z.

Canadian does exist as a separate variety of British English, with subtly distinctive features of
pronunciation and vocabulary. It has its own dictionaries; the Canadian Press has its own style guide; the
Editors’ Association of Canada has just released a second edition of Editing Canadian English. But an
emblematic feature of Editing Canadian English is comparison tables of American versus British spellings
so the Canadian editor can come to a reasonable decision on which to use… on each occasion. The core
of Canadian English is a pervasive ambivalence.

Canadian history helps to explain this. In the beginning there were the indigenous people, with far more
linguistic and cultural variety than Europe. They’re still there, but Canadian English, like Canadian
Anglophone society in general, gives them little more than desultory token nods. Fights between
European settlers shaped Canadian English more. The French, starting in the 1600s, colonised the St
Lawrence River region and the Atlantic coast south of it. In the mid-1700s, England got into a war with
France, concluding with the Treaty of Paris in 1763, which ceded ‘New France’ to England. The English
allowed any French to stay who were willing to become subjects of the English King.

At the time of the Treaty of Paris, however, there were very few English speakers in Canada. The
American Revolution changed that. The founding English-speaking people of Canada were United
Empire Loyalists – people who fled American independence and were rewarded with land in Canada.
Thus Canadian English was, from its very beginning, both American – because its speakers had come
from the American colonies – and not American, because they rejected the newly independent nation.

Just as the Americans sought to have a truly distinct, independent American version of English, the
loyalists sought to remain more like England… sort of. These were people whose variety of English was
already diverging from the British and vice versa: when the residents of London and its environs began
to drop their r’s and change some of their vowels people in certain parts of the United States adopted
some of these changes, but Canadians did not.

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage?
In boxes 1-5, chose

TRUE if the statement agrees with the information

FALSE if the statement contradicts the information
NOT GIVEN if there is no information on this
 
1 Canadian English is considered more like British English by Canadians. _____

2 According to the second paragraph, Canadian English is pretty similar to British, with some
minor differences. ______                    
3 The St Lawrence River was colonised by Canadians in 1600. _____

4 Canadian English is considered neither American nor not American. _____

5 The fifth paragraph states that many English-speaking countries adopted changes in
pronounciation. _____