Performance Plus for the HKDSE — All-in-one Exam Practice (Vol.

2) (2nd Edition) Set 6 Paper 1

Part B2

Q48 Lexical question #G synonym 

Q49 Question about the purpose of a paragraph 

Paragraph 1 introduces the story of He Daxing; the purpose is to highlight a social

issue in today’s China.

Q50 Reference question — back reference 

Q51 Question that requires judgement and evidence 

Q52 True / False / Not given question 

i) None of He Daxing’s six grown children would take him in (lines 5–7).
ii) Young adults are less willing to support their elders (lines 16–17).
iii) Life expectancy has soared in China (line 18).

Q53 Open-ended question #G short response 

Students have to synthesise the information given in lines 14–16, lines 21–22 and
lines 27–29.

In Text 3, the phrase ‘timebomb’ refers to a developing problematic situation

(ageing population) which will eventually become dangerous if not addressed.

Q54 Factual question 

Clue: ‘China’s economic miracle has been fuelled by its demographic dividend’
(lines 25–26)

Q55 i) Implicit reference question 

Students have to understand the main idea in paragraph 5. The unusually high
proportion of working age citizens is now becoming old (it is predicted that by
2030, there will be just two workers for every over-60) and hence it is
becoming a problem.

ii) Question that requires judgement and evidence 

Q56 Open-ended question — short response 

Students have to understand what it means by ‘demographic debt’ in the question.

Demographic debt (as opposed to demographic dividend) refers to an unusually
high proportion of elderly citizens or non-working age citizens.

The problem is worse than that in cities because tens of millions of young people
have migrated to the cities, and most old people in the rural areas rely on their own
labour or their children.

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Performance Plus for the HKDSE — All-in-one Exam Practice (Vol. 2) (2nd Edition) Set 6 Paper 1

Q57 Factual question 

‘Accepting immigrants’ is a possible solution.

Q58 Gap-filling question — summary 

iii) Clue: ‘stability’ (line 58) noun  adjective

iv) Clue: ‘legitimacy’ (line 58) noun  adjective
v) Students have to think of a suitable word based on lines 66–67. Wang Feng
suggests that the Chinese government should revise or change the one-child
policy.
vi) Students have to think of a suitable comparative adjective based on line 65.
Clue: ‘well below’  lower (than)
vii) Students have to think of a number based on line 67. Clue: ‘two-child policy’
 two children

Do not give one mark if more than one word is used.

Q59 Factual question 

Q60 Inference question 

To answer this question, students have to synthesise information from various

paragraphs. Young adults are less willing to support their elderly parents (paragraph
3). Children and their spouses can find their parents’ demands excessive or
intrusive (paragraph 12).

The fact that some officials want to introduce laws that force children to visit the
aged parents regularly only indicates one thing — parents do not have a good or
close relationship with their children.

Q61 Factual question 

Option (ii) is incorrect because ‘simply lack time to help’ (lines 89–90) is a general
statement that applies to all children, not specifically to He’s children.

Q62 Factual question 

Option B is true (line 94) but it is not why Liu is prepared to stay at an old people’s
home when she becomes old.

Q63 Open-ended question — advanced interpretation 

In Chinese society, children are expected to be dutiful (lines 71–72) and they are
expected to meet their parents’ physical and emotional needs (lines 74–77). This
includes living with them and supporting them financially. So, to send parents to a
care home is considered a shame or is highly unacceptable for any dutiful children.

Q64 Implicit reference question 

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Performance Plus for the HKDSE — All-in-one Exam Practice (Vol. 2) (2nd Edition) Set 6 Paper 1

Students have to infer the answer from lines 113–115. ‘Here’ (line 112) refers to
Evergreen (an old people’s home in north Beijing).

Q65 Factual question 

Q66 Factual question 

i) China has only enough care home places for 1.6% of over 60s (lines 118–119).
In other words, there are not enough care home places.

Q67 Open-ended question — short response 

Q68 Question that requires advanced interpretation 

In the text, the writer explores the issues and social problems caused by the ageing
population in China and discusses the policies that aim at halting the undesirable
consequences, including revising the one-child policy, setting up more old people’s
home places and passing laws to order children to visit their parents.

Q69 Question that requires judgement and evidence 

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