On Line Class versus Physical Class

There are some advantages and some disadvantages in both online mode and physical mode of attending
classes. One can attend classes through online mode sitting at home. S/he does not need to undergo any
physical, mental, monetary and traveling hazards. He does not need to waste time on the roads, face jams,
loss of time and energy to attend the class through online mode. On the other hand, one needs to journey,
face traffic-jam, spend, time, money and lose energy for attending classes physically. But attending classes
physically helps a student to develop not only physically but also mentally. They can directly come in
contact with teachers' association. Students and teachers can directly get involved in classroom and learning
activities. They can have direct interactions among themselves. Students can play together both with their
classmates and the teachers as well. It is not possible through online mode. Students who attend classes by
using online platform cannot come closer to their teachers. However, attending classes physically have some
disadvantages as well. Classes sometimes become boring and noisy. In adverse situations or emergency
situation, like Covid Pandemic, or heavy rainfall, hartal, strike, disruption of transport communication and
attending classes from a far distance, online mode of education or classes are more fruitful. Nevertheless,
attending too many classes through online platform may make a student physically and mentally sick.
Teachers and students are to use modern electric and electronic devices and modern education tools a lot in
online platform. By attending classes physically a student can draw more benefit and can participate in
sports and cultural and extracurricular activities directly and practically. But if a student wants to learn s/he
can do that by using any of the platforms. It does not differ much whether s/he is attending classes
physically or through online mode. There is a proverb that if one wants to learn nobody can stop him/her and
if a student does not want to learn nobody can force him/her. So, whatever method we may adopt our goal
should be to get the best out of both these modes of education.
Public Versus Private University
There are two main streams of education in Bangladesh - public and private. Public universities are run by
the government fund. Government subsidizes to run public universities. There are more than 70 public
universities in Bangladesh. Because of the constraint of seats in public universities, private universities have
flourished in Bangladesh. Public universities have big campuses, big classrooms, hostel facilities. Fee
structures of public universities are very low. Even the poorest students can pursue their education in public
universities. On the other hand private universities are housed on small buildings. Their classroom size is
very small. They don't have hostel facilities and they have hardly any campus facilities. Fees of private
universities are extremely high. The poor student cannot afford the fees of a private university. But they have
AC the classrooms, multimedia facilities. They are free from politics, violence and session jam. On the other
hand public universities are infested with political activities, violence and session jam. Private universities
offer only market oriented and profit earning courses. On the contrary public universities offer all types of
subjects – science, commerce arts etc. Some private universities are doing pretty good in Bangladesh but
most of them do not bother about maintaining standard and quality of education. They have turned into mere
certificate selling centers. Public universities try to mention quality but now-a-days quality of public
university education has deteriorated.

1.Read the passage carefully and answer the questions given below:
Once upon a time there lived in the city of Baghdad a young bachelor who was by trade a porter.
One day, as he sat in the marker-place leaning idly against his basket, a young woman, dressed in
rare silks and cloaked in a gold-embroidered mantle of Mosul brocade, stopped before him and
gently raised her veil. Beneath it there showed dark eyes with long lashes and lineaments of perfect
beauty.

“Lift up your basket, porter,” she said in a sweet voice, “and follow me.”At once the porter took up
his basket and followed her, thinking to himself; “This is indeed a blessed day!” until she stopped at
the door of a house and knocked. The door was opened by a Christian, who gave her, in return for a
piece of gold, a measure of olives and two cases of wine. These she put into the basket and said to the
porter, “Follow me.”
“By Allah,” thought the porter, “this is surely my lucky day!”
He took up his basket and followed her until she stopped at a fruiterer’s, where she bought Syrian
apples an Othmani quinces, Peaches from and Sultani citrons, sweet-scented myrtle and henna
flowers,

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chamomile, anemones, violets, sweet-briar and pomegranate-blossom. All these she put into the basket
and again said to the porter, “Follow me.”

She stopped at a butcher’s stall and said to him “cut me ten pounds of meat.” She wrapped the meat
in a large banana-leaf and putting it into the basket, ordered the porter to follow her. She next made
her way to a grocer’s shop, where she bought pistachios, nuts and raisins, and then to a
confectioner’s where she chose a platter of dainty sweetmeats stuffed with almonds and flavoured
with musk; lemon cakes, pastry, crescents. Zainab’s combs and honey tarts. And all these she placed
into the porter’s basket. “Had you told me,” observed the porter, “ I would have brought a mule to
carry all these things!”The young woman smiled at the porter’s remark and bidding him bold his
tongue, stopped at a perfume-seller’s and bought tem different essences, rose-water, willow water
and musk-rose dew, tow loaves of sugar, a sprinkling bottle, frankincense, aloe-wood, ambergris and
candles of Alexandrine followed her until she came to a magnificent, lofty house facing a great
courtyard. Its doors were of ebony plated with gold.
a) Who is the porter? What was he doing?
b) How was the lady look like?
c) Why did she hire the porter?
d) What was the reaction of the porter when he saw that the lady was so many items?
e) Summarise the passage and give an appropriate title.
f) What did the lady buy?
Volcanoes
Volcanoes are not scattered randomly around the world. If you were asked to name countries in
which Volcanoes occur, you would probably think of places such as Japan, Iceland, Hawaii, Italy,
New Zealand, and so on. At first, these areas may seem quite unrelated, but no matter what countries
you think of, the Volcanoes in them have one rather odd thing in common they are all very near the
sea. This isn’t such an irrelevant statement as it may sound – it is a fact that almost all the Volcanoes
in the world are within a couple of hundred kilometers of the sea. There are remarkably few active
Volcanoes in the central mountain belt, none in central Asia or Australia, and only one away from the
coast in Antarctica. There are some important areas which are exceptions in Africa, and also some
specialized, distinct group. Volcanoes mainly occur where huge tectonic plates meet on the surface of
the Earth.
Convert the words as directed and make sentences with those. 1x5=5
Distinct (n), Africa (adj), Sound (v), important (adv), remarkably (adj), Convert (n) directed(adv).

Text 3.4
Keeping warm is vital in winter. Not many people like cold weather, but for elderly people it can be
particularly uncomfortable and eve dangerous. The right food and drink are vitally important to keeping
warm and healthy in the long winter days. During cold weather, hot meals and plenty of hot drinks will
make you feel warmer inside. Don’t miss breakfast, have plenty of hot drinks and at least one hot main meal
each day. It’s also a good idea to have a hot drink before going to bed. As we get older our bodies are not as
good at keeping warm as they once ware. Try if possible to keep as active as you safely can and avoid being
inactive for long periods. Do not underestimate just how cold it can be outside. If you have to go out always
wear a cap or hat and several layers of light clothing and don’t just wear one layer of heavy clothing. You
take a few simple steps to help keep your home warmer in wintertime by not leaving doors and windows
open, remembering , of course, to ensure there is enough ventilation on keep the air fresh in rooms where
heating appliances are in use.

Earthquakes
An earthquake destroys buildings by shaking them to pieces. Engineers are finding ways to keep them
standing when the ground moves. As an engineer in California observed in the aftermath of the 1989 quake:
Earthquakes don’t kill people. Building do. Nobody wants to spend extra money to prepare for something
that may never happen, and earthquakes engineering has long been neglected. That attitude is now changing.
Earthquakes engineers may not have needed to be remained that building design can make all the difference
between life and death, but recent quakes have increased public interest in earthquakes-resistant designs.

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These range from reinforcing masonry walls with steel beams to strengthen them, to supporting an entire
building on rubber so that the structure can float in isolation.

Text 4.5
Some people argue that everyone who claims to have seen or to have photo- graphed the Loch Ness monster
has been either drunk, deceived by a log or interested in promoting the Scottish tourist industry. On the other
hand, many people are quite prepared to concede that some animal or group of animals has been seen in the
loch. The issue is whether this animal can be identified as the monster. There is (to date) only one
photograph of the creature. It has been studied carefully by experts, and the general consensus is that the
picture reveals a row of playful otters. For this reason, arguments for the existence of the monster based on
visual evidence have met with a good deal of skepticism. Another approach has been to consider how
monsters might be able to survive in a freshwater environment. Could they obtain enough food to sustain
themselves? Those that believe that they could, point out that loch ness is very deep, and moreover that it
may be connected by a series of subterranean passages with the sea, allowing the monster to feed. Some say
that the animal will be a whale or a basking shark which has lost its way or even come inland to die, and that
this could explain the rare sightings.
Nuclear energy
At a time when scientific advance was seen as universally beneficial, the nuclear industry was judged to be
at the cutting edge to technology. It was crucial to country’s status as an advanced nation. But there is a
second powerful strategic argument which propelled unclear power forward in Britain, as in other countries.
This is the fact that it is based on what has appeared to be a uniquely simple fuel, and one whose
exploitation cloud avoid dependence on a variety of other uncertain choices. One of the arguments for the
development of nuclear energy in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War was a predicted
shortage of coal. Coal provided the fuel for much the greater part to the country’s electricity. There were
power cuts over the winter of 1947 because the industry could not cope with the demand. Worse was
expected to come as industrial and domestic consumption of electricity picked up after the attrition of the
war years. Now, however, there was an alternative. A single pound of uranium, it was claimed, would
produce the same energy as a thousand tons of coal, whilst a hundred tons of uranium could provide all the
electricity that the country could possibly need. In fact, apart from industrial disputes, the unclear industry’s
pessimistic predictions about supplies of fossil fuels have been proved wrong in practice. Fossil fuels came
to be a problem, not because of shortages, but because they cause pollution. Similarly, after the Chernobyl
disaster, unclear energy was seen to bring dangers of a different kind.
Dinosaur eggs
A collection of 80-millon-year-old eggs has shed new light on the parenting style of dinosaurs, suggesting
that some of them built nests and cared for their young much as birds do today. The ancient Troodons,
whose nearly intact nests ware discovered in Montana, ware in some ways closer to modern birds than to
crocodiles and other reptiles, according to a report in nature many scientists believe birds are evolutionary
descendants of dinosaurs. Troodons ware fast slender-limbed creatures about the size of adult humans, and
many have been among the most intelligent of dinosaurs. Several nests of fossilized Troodon eggs ware
discovered on Montana’s Egg Mountain, in Teton Country. Researchers studying the nests concluded, based
on their positions that the eggs ware laid two at a time in a bird like pattern that suggests parental incubation
of the eggs. The eggs also are relatively large with thick tough shells. By contrast crocodiles lay a large
number of smaller eggs in a signal batch. The eggs are buried under sediment and the offspring are left to
fend for themselves after hatching.

Shoe factory blast kills 1

7 critically injured
Staff Correspondent
One worker died while at least seven others were critically injured in a fire caused by a chemical drum
explosion at a shoe factory in West Islamabagh of the old Dhaka yesterday. The fire broke out around
4:30pm killing Sabbir Hossain, 22, employee of Shikder Plastic Factory, on the spot. Injured workers Dipu,
13, Sharif, 18, Rubel, 22, Babu, 25, Ujjal, 26, Sohel, 30, and Sentu, 35, have been admitted to the burn unit
of Dhaka Medical College Hospital with 19 to 90 percent burn. After visiting the spot, Station Officer of
Lalbagh Fire Station Nasrin Sultana told The Daily Star that two fire engines had doused the flame
immediately.

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She said fire fighters had found the blown-up chemical drum outside the tin-shed factory which is housed on
the roof of a two-storey building. Eye witness Arif Hossain, worker of an adjacent factory said: “Sparks
from a nearby welding work originated the fire. At that time, workers were spraying the soles. The sprayers
soon caught fire and spread the blaze.”Arif said another fire had broken out in the same factory on the third
day of this Ramadan injuring three people.
(Source: The Daily Star)

Cop killed in arson attack on bus

2 others injured; AL MP among 15 hurt in clash; cattle-laden truck set ablaze
A policeman was killed and another burned as arsonists set fire to a police bus at Bangla Motor in the capital
last night. Driver of the requisitioned bus, a civilian, also suffered burn in the attack around 11:20pm, hours
after the opposition alliance's 83-hour blockade ended. The dead is Ferdous, a traffic constable. The injured
are Faizul Islam, also a constable, and driver Bayzid. Meanwhile, two people burned earlier in arson attacks
died early hours today at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.The victims are truck driver Nazrul Islam, who
was burned when his vehicle was set afire in Gazipur on Monday, and truck helper Mazidul, who suffered
burns when his vehicle was set ablaze in Sirajganj on Saturday.   Constable Faizul told The Daily Star they
were on duty at Bangla Motor until 11:00pm yesterday and were about to leave the place. As soon as they
got on the bus, there was a huge bang and the vehicle was ablaze. He managed to get down as he was near
the door but Ferdous could not since he was inside and was burned alive, Faizul added.  The driver jumped
out through the window.    Inspector General of Police Hassan Mahmood Khandker and Dhaka Metropolitan
Police Commissioner Benazir Ahmed visited the victims at Dhaka Medical College Hospital.The police
chief said the policeman lost his life while he was serving the country and the people. He said criminals
were targeting his force as part of their attack on the state machinery. Meanwhile two truckers were badly
burned after blockaders set fire to a cattle-carrying truck at Sitakunda in Chittagong yesterday.
(Source: The Daily Star Report)

New PSC chairman takes oath

Staff Correspondent

Newly appointed chairman of Bangladesh Public Service Commission (PSC) Ikram Ahmed took oath
yesterday.Chief Justice Md Muzammel Hossain administered the oath to him at the Judges' Lounge of the
Supreme Court.SC Registrar AKM Shamsul Islam conducted the oath taking ceremony, where some PSC
officials were present.President Abdul Hamid on Monday appointed Ikram Ahmed as PSC chairman
replacing Ahmedul Huq Choudhury whose tenure expired on December 19.

 
Man murdered in capital
Staff Correspondent
Unidentified criminals killed a man in the capital's Lalbagh area on Monday.The deceased, Mohammad
Minar, 30, son of Lal Miah, used to live in his sister's Chawkbazar residence.Minar was found dead on the
rooftop of an 11-storey under-construction building in Lalbagh's New Paltan around 5:00pm, said SM
Shahjalal, officer-in-charge (investigation) of Lalbagh Police Station.Police suspected that he was strangled
with a rope as marks were visible in the throat.
 
TUB admission test today
Our Correspondent, Barisal 

The admission test of Barisal University for 2013-14 academic session will be held today.The test of 16
departments under six faculties will be held under four units – Ka, Kha, Ga and Gha.A total of 29,690
students will sit for the admission test this year against 1,160 seats, said Shafiul Alam, chairman of the
admission committee.

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