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SECTION 01 · Reading: separate texts

Reading

Choose a text number. Its questions will appear on its own page.

35 texts

Text 7Book 3 · Section 1 · 7 / 35

How to solve: ReadingA text with several questions: main idea, details, word meaning and inference.

What it tests

Careful reading: finding the main idea, locating details, understanding a word from its context and drawing conclusions the text supports.

In the exam: part I, 10 tasks.

Step by step

Read the questions first, so you know what to look for.
Skim the whole text once for its topic and the author's purpose.
For each question find the exact place in the text (line numbers help) and read the sentence before and after it.
Choose the option that says the same thing in other words — not the one that copies the most words.
For “main idea” questions pick the option that covers the whole text, not one paragraph.

Watch out for

An option that is true in real life but not stated in the text.
An option that repeats words from the text but changes the meaning (“always” instead of “often”, wrong date or person).
A detail that is correct but too narrow for a “main idea” question.

Example

Text: “It took 800 men seven years to build the bridge.” — The bridge was built in: a) one year b) seven years c) 800 days

b) The text says “seven years”; 800 is the number of men, not days.

Text 7

READING TEXT

If you have visited a marine park, you probably know which animals steal
the show − the dolphins. They delight visitors with their tricks. They ring
bells, blow horns, and play basketball. Using their powerful tail fins, they
“walk” backward in the water.
Social, playful, and curious, dolphins get along well with humans. They
learn to do tricks quickly. Sometimes they make up their own. To teach a
dolphin to do tricks, a trainer uses its natural abilities. For example, dolphins
often jump out of the water. So it's a short step to teaching the animals to jump
through hoops or over bars. .
Dolphins, also called “porpoises', are toothed whales. They are not fish, but
mammals — animals that, as babies, drink milk. Mammals include such clever
animals as monkeys and apes. Yet some scientists think that dolphins, with
their large, well-developed brains, maty possess more intelligence than do
monkeys and apes.
To communicate with one another, dolphins whistle, squeak, growl, or
moan. Some scientists think that these animals eventually can be trained to
communicate with humans through a language of signs and symbols.

QUESTION 1

According to Paragraph 1, lines 1—4,

a)visitors amuse dolphinsb)dolphins entertain visitorsc)dolphins can walk on the waterd)visitors play basketball

QUESTION 2

According to Paragraph 2, lines 5—9,

a)it's not easy to teach dolphins to do tricksb)dolphins use their own abilities to teach trainers to do tricksc)dolphins are taught to do tricks due to their natural abilitiesd)it's very difficult for trainers to teach dolphins to jump through hoops

QUESTION 3

The author states in the text that dolphins

a)are brainless mammalsb)have well-developed brainsc)are the most intelligent fishd)are not sociable and playful

QUESTION 4

The word mammals in line 11 may be defined as

a)monkeys and apesb)intelligent animalsc)creatures fed on milkd)porpoises and whales

QUESTION 5

According to the text, dolphins

a)can be taught a foreign languageb)can't communicate with one anotherc)may be trained to communicate with peopled)communicate with people through the language of symbols