2.01 Задание 10. Задание на понимание основного содержания прочитанного текста

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1. A job for anybody

2. Start your business

3. A job with a high salary

4. Choosing a job

5. Zoopsychologist

6. Night work

7. Working with your hands

8. Working for royals

A. Some people can’t get out of the house easily to shop, don’t have the time to do it or just don’t enjoy shopping. If shopping is something you enjoy, turn it into a self-employed career. Personal shoppers give advice to customers and suggest products that may suit their needs. This can be anything from gifts to household goods to clothing. Advertise your services at locations such as senior citizens’ centres, community centres, shopping malls and grocery stores. Meet with the clients and find out what items (groceries, clothing, etc.) they need and how often.

B. The market is changing very fast. In fact, there may be careers that exist when a student gets out of college that simply didn’t exist when they started. So rather than asking, “What do I want to be?,” pose these questions: “What skills do I have? What kinds of people do I like to work with? In what kind of environment?” This is a way to think about a career without necessarily naming it. You describe yourself in a functional way and then figure out what that’s called and if people get paid to do it.

C. The regulations define this as the period between 11 pm and 6 am although this agreement can be slightly varied between employers and workers. Generally, people who work for at least three hours within the period must be offered a free health assessment before they begin their work duties and on a regular basis. Workers, however, do not have to accept this check. In general, workers must be over 18, although there are some exceptions to this rule. Teenagers aged 16 and 17, for example, can work according to this schedule, but only for 40 hours per week

D. When your dog won’t roll over or your cat is making a mess, you might have to call someone who specialises in pet behaviour to solve your problems. This person analyses the pet’s confidence and security inside and outside the home to find the source of the problem. By studying their instincts and social rituals in their natural habitat as well as around humans, they modify the unwanted behaviour. It is all about helping dogs, cats and horses feel safe and confident and secure inside and outside our homes.

E. Being a queen’s piper involves playing the bagpipes for 15 minutes at 9 am under the Queen’s window when she is in residence at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, the Palace of Holyroodhouse or Balmoral Castle. The piper is also responsible for the co-ordination of the 12 Army pipers who play around the table after State Banquets. It’s important to be presentable and patient enough when escorting the Queen to the various audiences that she has throughout the day.

F. A surgeon starts with a Bachelor’s degree, specializes in medicine and finally, surgery and then spends up to seven years as an intern or a resident. If you want to cut people open, they want to be really sure you know what you are doing. The field will be growing, as people now live longer. This is one of the highest demand and best paid jobs in the US because it takes so much skill and precision. Wages vary depending on the type of surgery, but on average this was the highest paid medical job in 2015.

G. Imagine you’re an electrician, you’re installing a pipe and have to bend around the corners to make everything line up. This kind of work requires improvisation and creativity. Besides, the wages of manual workers are greater than in many office jobs. For instance, a skilled mechanic usually earns more than a sociology graduate working in publishing. Besides, the job offers small moments of joy, like when the bike you’re mending starts up and runs. But not everything about manual work is rosy. Furniture making, for example, is not a good career move.

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1. Penguins’ diet

2. No longer a secret

3. Sound identification

4. Are penguins birds?

5. Different homes

6. Enemies everywhere

7. Living in Antarctica

8. How big are penguins?

A. Penguin sizes range from the largest penguin species, which can be as tall as 45 inches and weigh as much as 60 to 90 pounds, to the smallest penguin, which only reaches 12 inches in height and weighs 2 to 3 pounds. The largest species of penguin, the Emperor penguin, averages 66 pounds and a height of 3.8 feet and lives in Antarctica. The second-largest penguin, the King penguin, looks similar to the Emperor penguin but is found in the subAntarctic belt, rather than in Antarctica.

B. Penguins are flightless birds. The main types of predators that eat penguins are marine animals, such as leopard seals, whales and sharks. Many land animals are also a threat to penguins in Antarctica and include birds like petrels, skuas and seagulls. These birds either steal penguin eggs or kill their chicks. Penguins, which live in other areas of the world like the Galapagos Islands, Australia and South Africa, can have different land predators that include snakes, ferrets, lizards and foxes.

C. All known species of penguins live naturally in the southern hemisphere of the world. They actually occupy habitats that are located on each of the five continents within the southern hemisphere. Antarctica, which is known for its low temperatures, is a habitat for only five breeds of penguins. The majority of penguins prefer colder climates, but there are some species that prefer a slightly warmer climate. The Galapagos penguin, for example, resides far north near the Galapagos Islands.

D. Penguins primarily communicate vocally, but they also communicate through body language and posturing. Penguins all look virtually identical, which makes individual recognition very difficult. To overcome this, penguins have evolved different sounding voices and the ability to recognize the individual voices of their mates or chicks. This allows the birds to recognize and find their mates or chicks among the masses, which all look the same. Besides, penguins produce different types of calls.

E. While penguins do not fly, they are incredible swimmers. In 2012, scientists managed to discover at last that the reason why Emperor penguins are able to swim so quickly through the ocean is not only because of the feathers on their flippers but also because of bubbles. It is surprising to learn about the bubbles penguins use to coat their bodies as they swim through the water. This coating of bubbles makes them more slippery and they are able to slide through the water at top speeds of 12 to 77 feet per second.

F. Penguins catch their food while swimming in the ocean. Penguins primarily eat fish, squid and krill that they catch with their sharp beaks. Over their evolutionary history, the ancestors of modern penguins lost their ability to fly in exchange for becoming extraordinary swimmers. Penguins are among the most skilled fish-eating animals in the world, which is necessary to fuel their high caloric needs. In contrast to cold-blooded fish, penguins must eat a lot to heat their bodies internally in cold weather.

G. Penguins are not mammals, even though they are warm-blooded animals. Penguins are one of only a few species of flightless birds left in the world. Many people mistakenly believe penguins have fur instead of feathers because of the tight packing of feathers on their bodies. Most birds could not survive the frigid temperatures, but penguins store ample fat reserves that protect them in the water. They have the tightly-woven feathers that protect them on land, and they stand in huddles to share body warmth.

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1. Female bobsleighing

2. What you need for bobsleighing

3. Safety rules

4. Bobsleighing techniques

5. Participating countries

6. The dangers of bobsleighing

7. The newest rules

8. From the history of bobsleighing

A. Bobsleighing was originated in Switzerland. In the late 19th century, the Swiss first started doing it by attaching two skeleton sleighs together with a steering mechanism added to the front sleigh in order to control the direction. The first bobsleigh races took place in normal snow covered roads whereas the first bobsleighing club was founded in St. Moritz, Switzerland in 1897 and the first specially designed race track was developed outside of St. Moritz in 1902.

B. Bobsleighing is mostly played in Europe along with North America and Russia because of the proper climate for the icy track. The United States of America, Germany and Switzerland have long been the most successful bobsleighing nations based on their incredibly successful track record in all formats of competitive sports including World Cups and Olympic Championship. Presently, more than fifty countries take part in various international bobsleighing events all over the world.

C. Bobsleighing is considered the most expensive winter sport as the equipment used in it, including the safety equipment as well as bobsleigh parts, are quite costly. The most important equipment in bobsleighing is the sleigh. Besides this other protective guards are also used. The length of the sleigh must be a maximum of 3.80 metres (12.5 feet) for fourman sports and 2.70 metres (8.9 feet) in case of two-man sports. Bobsleigh crews are supposed to weigh heavy to ensure high speed.

D. In fact, two-man and four-man types of bobsleigh are very much similar. As weight plays a vital role for the speed of the sleigh, four-man sleighs are much faster than two-man types. However, even a simple mistake at the initial push-off or, say, during the steering, on decisions of the driver during the turns may largely affect the final race. The thing is, air passing through the sleigh slows the sleigh down. In order to avoid these drags, wind tunnels are usually added to the sleigh.

E. One may think bobsleighing is a risky sport but actually not only men are fond of it. Women do it too. In case of women bobsleighing, the sleighs for women were originally very much similar to those of men. But with time so many problems came out as women are shorter than men and many players injured their hips as well as back. These traumas prompted the organizers to change the interior sleigh designs for women bobsleighing. Now women can do it safely and successfully enough.

F. Bobsleighing competitions gather crowds of people who want to watch their favourite sportsmen compete with one another. However, even though bobsleighing is quite an interesting sport, the risks attached to it certainly cannot be avoided. Till now more than ninety three players have died in crashes or accidents during the game. In order to reduce the chances of accidents and to prevent the risks, officials have made certain rules and regulations about the uses of sleighs and the structure of the track.

G. There are a lot of risks connected with bobsleighing. Bobsleighers need to wear high tech plastic made helmets in order to prevent head injuries as well as goggles for eyes. Racers wear tight uniforms to increase aero-dynamicity and spiked shoes to gain traction on the ice. The brakeman wears a Kevlar vest in order to avoid third degree burns during the sleigh’s friction with ice. The next bobsleigh doesn’t start until the previous team has left the track because of security reasons.

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1. Better clever than lucky

2. Partnership needed

3. Play and learn!

4. A happy chance

5. Glimpses of history

6. Making the game unpredictable

7. A big business

8. Games on your mobile

A. If a student is shy and it is hard to make him or her speak English during a lesson, communication games can be a good solution to the problem. There are literally thousands of board and card games developed by hundreds of enthusiastic teachers worldwide. The Internet will also offer you many shops selling games you can use during your lesson. This way your students will concentrate on the game itself without realizing that, in fact, they are being taught something, and they will feel comfortable.

B. Most people don’t realize board games are actually prehistoric, meaning we had board games before we had written language. Dice was the basis of humanity’s oldest board games. Some years ago, a series of 49 small carved painted stones were found in southeast Turkey. They are thought to be more than 5000 years old and they are the earliest gaming pieces ever found. Similar pieces have recently been found in Syria and Iraq and some other places and seem to point to board games originating there.

C. Many games require some level of both skill and luck. A player may be hampered by bad luck in backgammon, Monopoly or Risk but over many games a skilled player will win more often, and the elements of luck can make for more excitement, and more diverse and multifaceted strategies, as concepts such as expected value and risk management must be considered. European board games are notable for having less luck element than North American ones but there are exceptions, of course.

D. While the board gaming market is still estimated to be smaller than that for video games, it has also experienced significant growth from the late 1990s. The rise in board game popularity has been attributed to quality improvement as well as increased availability. A 1991 estimate for the global board game market was over $1.2 billion. A 2001 estimate for the US ‘board games and puzzle’ market gave a value of under $400 million, and for the UK, of about £50 million – that’s quite a lot, actually.

E. A lot of people enjoy playing board games but they don’t have time to play them at leisure. However, they have time to kill on public transport, when stuck in traffic jams or queuing. There’s good news for board game lovers – there are literally thousands of applications for both iPhone and Android platforms where they can find familiar board games in a convenient format. You can play against artificial intelligence or find a person to play with online. You can now play your favourite games anytime and anywhere.

F. Luck may be introduced into a game by many different methods. The use of a dice of various sorts goes back to the earliest board games. These can decide everything from how many steps a player moves their token, as in Monopoly, to how their forces fare in battle, as in Risk, or which resources a player gains, as in The Settlers of Catan. Other games use special cards that, when shuffled, create randomness. Other games use spinners, timers of random length and so on. This creates unexpected twists.

G. An important aspect of some board games is diplomacy – that is, players making deals with one another. Negotiation generally features only in games with three or more players, cooperative games being the exception. An important facet of The Settlers of Catan, for example, is convincing players to trade with you rather than with opponents. In Risk, two or more players may team up against others. Diplomacy may involve making elaborate plans together thus having more chance to win the game

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1. An important symbol

2. Preserving cherries

3. Eat more cherries!

4. Growing cherries

5. Figuratively speaking

6. What do cherries look like?

7. A cheap fruit

8. Glimpses of history

A. Cherries look beautiful. They are small fruits, generally averaging 2 to 4 centimeters in diameter. Cherries have a round or an oval shape and are attached to brown stems. The fruit’s surface is smooth and glossy, ranging in colour from solid shades of bright red or dark red, almost black, to red-yellow, orange, ruby, and crimson tones. Underneath the surface, the flesh can be firm or soft, depending on the variety, and is typically pink or red. Cherries have small stones which you need to take out before cooking or eating the fruit.

B. Cherries are a rich source of anthocyanins – coloured pigments found within their skin and flesh that have antioxidant-like properties to reduce inflammation and protect the cells against free radical damage. The fruits also contain vitamins A and C to boost the immune system and promote healthy organ functioning, potassium to balance fluid levels within the body, fiber to regulate the digestive tract, some iron to build hemoglobin for oxygen transport through the bloodstream, and calcium to strengthen bones and teeth.

C. In Japan, there are several varieties of cherry trees that are highly favoured for their flowers, even though they don’t bear fruit. These cherry blossoms, known as Sakura in Japanese, are the country’s national flower which is celebrated during the annual Hanami Festival. The event was first established during the Nara Period to celebrate renewal, life, and natural beauty. Nowadays, the festival is traditionally held in the spring, and visitors flock to the blooming trees to take photos or capture the blossom’s beauty in artwork.

D. Cherries were first cultivated around 4000 BC in China. Cherries were also wildly grown and consumed in Ancient Greece and Rome, with the first written account recorded by the Greek author Theophrastus in his book, The History of Plants, published in 300 BC. In Ancient Rome, cherries were consumed by Roman soldiers, and the pits were discarded along roads and camps, leading to Cherry trees being scattered across Europe. Commercial cherries were developed in Europe only in the 15th century.

E. Irrigation, spraying, labour and their tendency to damage from rain and hail make cherries expensive, but the fruit is still high in demand. The peak season for cherries is the summer months. In many parts of North America, they’re among the first tree fruits to ripen, while in Australia and New Zealand cherries are widely associated with Christmas because they peak in late December. In the USA, most sweet cherries are grown in Washington and California, whereas sour cherries are grown in Michigan, New York, Utah and Washington.

F. Get your hands on some fresh cherries during the summer and make jams and jellies that you can enjoy all year long. Still, the healthiest way to keep cherries fresh is in plain water. Cherries are sweet enough, so you don’t need extra sugar. Start by washing the cherries and pitting them. You don’t have to pit them before jarring, but it makes them easier to eat later. Keep tapping the jar on the counter to remove air bubbles. Then, add the rest of your water. Before putting the lid on, make sure the cherries are completely covered, and tap the jar a few more times.

G. There are a lot of interesting idioms and expressions with the word ‘cherry’ in the English language. For instance, a person who is a novice or a newcomer is often referred to as a cherry in modern English. If somebody is really embarrassed about something, they may get as red as a cherry. If you are given a chance or an opportunity to do something, you get a bite at the cherry. If you are happy with your life at the moment, you can say your life is like a bowl of cherries. It’s certainly fun to know such things.

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1. Going up and coming down

2. A new epoch in construction

3. From protection into fun

4. The choice of the material matters

5. A royal fortress

6. Various activities to do

7. Similar but different

8. Higher and stronger

A. Castles and palaces may seem alike. However, there are some distinctions between them. A castle is a strong and fortified building made of stone. It has tall walls and sometimes even a surrounding water-filled ditch, called a moat. Castles were built to protect people from enemies and attacks. On the other hand, a palace is a luxurious residence designed primarily for comfort and elegance. Palaces were not built for defense like castles, so they usually didn’t have thick walls, towers, or other fortification features.

B. During the early days, castles were constructed using wood. Recognizing this weakness, lords and castle builders began using stone as the main material for constructing castles. Stone castles provided greater protection and durability against attacks. In terms of attacking these stone castles, the primary weapons used were battering rams and catapults. Battering rams were large, heavy objects used to forcefully strike castle gates, while catapults were siege engines designed to launch projectiles, such as rocks or flaming objects.

C. During the medieval period, specifically between the 11th and 13th centuries, castles were commonly constructed on elevated, man-made hills known as mottes. The primary purpose of building castles on mottes was to enhance their defensive capabilities. Mottes were typically large, artificial hills that provided strategic advantages. By elevating the castle above the surrounding area, defenders had a better point to observe and protect the surrounding lands. The height of the mottes allowed soldiers to have a broader range to defend against potential attackers.

D. In the past, castles used moats as a defense. Moats were ditches dug around the castle to guard it from enemies. They were often filled with water to make it difficult for attackers to tunnel into the castle. However, in some castles, people came up with more unique ideas. For example, at Český Krumlov Castle in the Czech Republic, the moat has been filled with bears since 1707. Nowadays, the bears have someone to take care of them, and they even have birthday parties and festivals organized for them.

E. One interesting detail about castles is their spiral stairwells. These staircases are designed to spiral in a specific direction, usually clockwise. The reason for this clever design was to put invaders at a disadvantage during a battle. Most people, including swordsmen, were right-handed and held their swords in their right hand. When invaders climbed the spiral stairs, they were not be able to use their dominant sword arm effectively, because the narrow space of the staircase restricted their movement during battles.

F. The Norman Conquest of 1066 was a significant event in British history. It marked the invasion and successful takeover of England by William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy. After the Norman Conquest, William the Conqueror and his successors built numerous castles throughout England. These castles served as strategic fortifications and symbols of their power and control over the newly-conquered lands. They were used as defensive structures, residences for the nobility, and centres of administration.

G. Today Great Britain has a rich tradition of castle sites, which show the best examples of the legacy of medieval times. Windsor Castle, the home of the Kings and Queens’ families of the English Commonwealth, is both the oldest and largest continuously-inhabited castle in the world. It was built in the 11th century, after the Norman Invasion, and has been used by reigning monarchs since the reign of Henry I. The castle also houses the famous St. George’s Chapel, which is designed in Gothic style, and houses the Order of the Garter.

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1. Glimpses of history

2. Potentially dangerous

3. What does salt look like?

4. A popular myth

5. An unusual place to stay

6. A necessary substance

7. Expensive and unhealthy

8. Figuratively speaking

A. Salts can appear to be clear and transparent, opaque, and even metallic and lustrous. In many cases these differences are only related to the difference in the size of a crystal. Since light reflects from the phase boundaries, larger crystals tend to be transparent, while poly-crystalline aggregates look like white powders. Of course, some salts are inherently opaque. Salts may be colourless but they also exist in the full range of different colours – yellow, orange, red, blue, green, white and black. That’s why many synthetic or organic dyes are basically salts.

B. Food industry would not have appeared without salt. Meat-packing, sausage-making, fishprocessing and food-processing industries use salt as a preservative or seasoning or both. In the chemical industry salt is required in manufacturing sodium bicarbonate (baking soda), sodium hydroxide (caustic soda), chlorine and many other chemicals. Salt is also employed in soap, glaze, and porcelain enamel manufacturing and participates in metallurgical processes as a flux – a substance promoting fusing of metals.

C. Salt was so valuable in ancient Rome that soldiers were sometimes paid with it. In fact, the word ‘salary’ even comes from the Latin word for salt. Historically, salt’s value came from its ability to preserve food. Venice may be famous for its canals now, but it was the salt imports that fueled its rise as an influential trade power by the end of the 13th century. Salt also took on a great deal of symbolic value. This is the reason it is mentioned so many times in the Bible. Its preservative properties made it an apt metaphor for permanence and conviction.

D. There are many interesting idioms and expressions with the word ‘salt’ in the English language. For instance, if somebody is worth their salt, it means they are good at their job. If you take something with a grain of salt, it means that you understand that something is likely to be untrue or incorrect. Good and honest people are often called the salt of the earth. If you are trying to save some money, it means you’re salting the money away. If a person is in trouble but you make the situation worse for them, you rub salt in their wounds.

E. Most people think that salt has no other role in food rather than enhancing the taste and we can give up eating salt completely. However, nothing can be further from the truth. Salt plays a vital role in human health, and we all need to consume at least some salt every day. It facilitates the transport of nutrients and oxygen in our body, allows our nerves to transmit messages and helps our muscles work. The average adult’s body contains about 250 g of sodium – the equivalent of about three or four shakers of salt.

F. Most people know about the health risks associated with sodium, but reducing your intake of salt is easier said than done. According to health experts, an average person consumes around 10 g of salt per day, which is double the recommended amount. Since the taste for salt is acquired, reduced consumption should be practiced from an early age. Even if you don’t have hypertension, it’s still a good idea to cut down on your salt intake to reduce your blood pressure, according to numerous recent health reviews and studies.

G. Modern tourists often choose to go off the beaten track. Palacio de Sal is a resort hotel, which is located on the edge of the salt flats. It was built entirely of compressed salt blocks. Chairs, tables, beds and even a swimming pool are also made of local salt sources. It is located at the edge of the world’s largest salt flat in southwest Bolivia. The hotel has a dry sauna and a steam room, a saltwater pool and whirlpool baths. There is a rule in the hotel prohibiting licking the walls in order to prevent their degradation.

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1. Pet-friendly booking

2. Funny names

3. Different tactics

4. Seeing wild animals

5. Almost at the shore

6. Seaside observation point

7. Quiet places to explore

8. Various activities to do

A. The English have a very ironic sense of humour, and it may become clear when you discover what some of the towns and villages across England and the United Kingdom are called. Some are hilarious, while others are just plain rude. It is important to keep an eye out when you pass through the English countryside to see if you can spot a few on your travels. There’s Sheepy Parva and Sheepy Magna in Lancashire, Greedy Gut in Somerset, No Place in Derbyshire. There is always something to keep people entertained during their trip!

B. England is part of the British Isles and a large archipelago off the coast of Europe. It is not a very big country. In fact, you could fit all the United Kingdom, that is, England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, inside Texas, the USA, over 2.8 times. So, it shouldn’t come as too much surprise to know that you are never far from the sea when you are in England. In fact, even if you are standing in the very center of the country, you are still no more than 70 miles away from the coast. What a shame that the English weather doesn’t often encourage a beach day!

C. Badgers are not always a farmer’s best friends, but Badger Watch farm in deepest rural Dorset has decided to exploit rather than fight Britain’s cutest large mammals. Extremely difficult to spot, a badger seen in the wild is an unforgettable experience. Two specially designed hides at Badger Watch Dorset offer one of the best chances of finding one. Each hide can be booked privately for up to eight people, from 6.30 pm until the lights are shut off at midnight. Alongside badgers, the hides offer a good chance of seeing foxes, deer, and rabbits.

D. Holidays are the best opportunity to explore the UK and overseas territories, spending quality time with family or friends including a four-legged one. In fact, holidays are the best excuse to go on some nice dog adventure and give your dog the best time. To plan your perfect holiday, it’s a matter of finding a place suitable for dogs. The good news is that there is more choice than you may think. We found that almost all holiday accommodation and hotels have a filter which you can use to navigate your options, although some are better presented than others.

E. The Hebrides are a beautiful archipelago, where Scottish Gaelic is still spoken. Each day will be a combination of relaxation and adventure. On a full day’s excursion, we may spend four or five hours in the kayaks and cover between seven and ten miles, with plenty of opportunities to land and explore islands on foot. One of the best ways to explore its coastline and spot some of the many bird species, otters and seals is by kayak. We can offer full-day guided trips, taking in hidden coves, long sandy beaches, and hidden ancient sites.

F. You never forget your first whale. Such sightings are, of course, down to good fortune and timing, but once you’ve seen your first whale, you will want to see another and another. Famous for its whaling fleet, the Yorkshire coast is one of the best places in England to spot Minke whales, which appear in late summer, following the mackerel. From the coastline of the Outer Hebrides, you can spot up to 23 species of whales, more than a quarter of the world’s 89 known species, which pass through the waters off the west coast of Scotland.

G. In summer the possibility of finding a calm area away from the crowds of holiday-goers can be a difficult task. Known as the Heritage Coast, the Northumberland coast area of outstanding natural beauty is surprisingly crowd-free, even in high summer. If you’re willing to relax, you’ll find a number of excellent bathing beaches here. Heritage hunters and nature watchers are spoiled with fantastically arresting castles. Most striking is the mighty fortress at Bamburgh. Many architectural historians have declared this the most wondrous of all England’s coastal castles.

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1. Named after a politician

2. Too lengthy to stay

3. In hope for a good future

4. Named after a tsar

5. Modern pronunciation

6. Named after the river

7. Named after a wrong person

8. Bringing back the first name

A. One local legend claims that the city of Orlando is named after the character in Shakespeare’s “As You Like It”, but the more commonly accepted version is that a man named Orlando Reeves owned a plantation and a sugar mill a bit north of what later became the city. Early settlers found where Reeves had carved his name in a tree and thought that it was a grave marker to a soldier, a hero who died in the Seminole War and mistakenly named their settlement after him.

B. When Arizona city began expanding in the late 1860s, settlers realized that their little town needed a name. The founder of the city Jack Swilling, a Confederate veteran, wanted to name the town Stonewall in honour of Stonewall Jackson, but Darrell Duppa found out that their site had been a Native American settlement centuries earlier. He offered the name Phoenix. He believed that their new city would rise from the ruins of the former civilization like the legendary bird.

C. In 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip discovered a supply of fresh water for his thirsty armada in a cave near Port Jackson, today’s Sydney Harbor. Later he started a settlement there. The place needed a name. Though originally he had planned to name his new freshwater-filled settlement Albion – a poetic name for England – instead he decided to call the bay Sydney Cove after the Secretary of State, Lord Sydney. The fact that the guy had never even set foot in Australia didn’t stop him.

D. The Russian capital sits on the Moscva River, which is obviously where the city’s name comes from. However, there are a couple of theories as to where the name Moscva comes from. The first states that it is a derivative of a Finno-Ugric name meaning river of either cows, or bears, or darkness. Nobody is really sure which of the three exactly, but all of them seem quite possible. The other, more popular theory, says that the name comes from a Slavic word meaning dank, swampy river.

E. It’s widely known that the City of Angels got its name from Spanish settlers. The beauty of the place impressed them so much that they considered it heaven on Earth. The original name, however, was a lot longer: El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora la Reina de los Angeles de Porcincula, or “The Town of Our Lady the Queen of Angels of the Little Portion”. They realized there would be a lot of letters to fit on a hat they wore, so they just shortened it to Los Angeles.

F. Have you ever wondered why in a restaurant we never order Beijing duck, but instead call it Peking like our grandmas did? Well, since Chinese characters don’t much lend themselves to transliteration, English interpretations of how the name is pronounced have changed over the years. The name was given to the city during the Ming Dynasty by Zhu Di, who moved his capital there. “Beijing” is about as close as we can get now to saying it like the Chinese.

G. St. Petersburg was founded on May 16, 1703, when the foundation of the Peter and Paul Fortress was laid. Since its foundation, the city’s name has changed several times. Originally, it was named after the Apostle Peter as tsar Peter, the Apostle’s namesake, relied on this saint’s patronage. For a decade in the 1900’s it was called Petrograd. This was from 1914–1924. After Lenin died, Petrograd was renamed Leningrad. St. Petersburg resumed its original name in 1992.

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1.The power of music

2. Sound producers

3. Special knowledge needed

4. Musical sound characteristics

5. Differences in perception

6. The history of music

7. The choice of music matters

8. Different types of music

A. Music is a group of sounds that people have arranged in a meaningful way. Some musicians make up music as they perform. Others sing songs or play pieces that someone else created. Musicians have developed a system for writing down music so that others can play it again. They use certain symbols, called notes, to indicate the tones to be played or sung. The arrangement of the notes shows the order in which the tones should be played. Other numbers and symbols show how fast to play each note. They are known as musical notation.

B. Some music goes along with religious ceremonies. Other music is a part of everyday life. Traditional music made by everyday people is called folk music. Classical music is formal and artistic music that developed in Europe over hundreds of years. Orchestras, choirs, and chamber ensembles (small groups of musicians) often perform classical music. Opera is a type of classical music that features dramatic singing. When large numbers of people enjoy a type of music, it is called popular music.

C. People use their voices to sing. To make other kinds of music, they use musical instruments. Stringed instruments, like violins and harps, have tight strings that make sounds when people pluck or rub them. Wind instruments, like trumpets and saxophones, make sounds when people blow into them. Percussion instruments, like drums and rattles, make sounds when people hit or shake them. Keyboard instruments, like pianos and accordions, make sounds when people press their keys, buttons, or levers.

D. Rhythm describes the length of musical sounds. The most important part of rhythm is the pulse, or beat. Melody is a series of different tones, or sounds, in a piece of music. Harmony takes place when people play or sing more than one tone at the same time. Groups of tones played together are called chords. Harmony also describes the way chords go along with a melody. Form is the way that people put rhythm, melody, and harmony together. There are many different types of musical forms. Repeating a short melody is one of the simplest forms

E. If you want to firm up your body, head to the gym. If you want to exercise your brain, listen to music. Many of us instinctively know the effects of music on our mood and energy. There are few things that stimulate the brain the way music does. If you want to keep your brain engaged throughout the aging process, listening to or playing music is a great tool. It provides a total brain workout. Research has shown that listening to music can reduce anxiety, blood pressure, and pain, as well as improve sleep quality, mood, mental alertness, and memory.

F. Listening to classical music has a wide range of benefits for your brain and body. For example, it can help you with relaxation, concentration, memory, and cognition. Listening to relaxing music, such as smooth jazz, can induce an alpha-wave state in your brain. These waves occur when you’re awake but relaxed, making smooth jazz one of the best ways to wind down at the end of a long day. Rap music often tells stories of people overcoming obstacles or achieving success in the face of unlikely odds.

G. If you ask some people about the benefits of listening to music while trying to concentrate, you could hear mixed reviews. Listening to music to help us concentrate works differently for everyone. Some people might think it’s a remarkable study habit, while others may find it useless because it only distracts them. But branching out and trying new ways of boosting your concentration might help you find a practice that works well. It isn’t easy to find strategies that work specifically for you.

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1. What is a desert?

2. Smart desert plants

3. The land of treasure

4. How do deserts form?

5. The desert statistics

6. The symbol of deserts

7. A unique white habitat

8. Deserts are dangerous

A. Although the typical idea of a desert is a vast sandy place with little water, a desert is more than that. It is actually classified as any area of land that has not received any rain for a minimum of 12 straight months or a very dry area that receives less than 10 inches of rain every year. The reason for dryness in a desert is also connected with high evaporation and transpiration rates. The ground loses much water through a high evaporation rate. Plants lose their water through a high transpiration rate.

B. The plants that grow in the desert include various forms of cacti, low-lying plants like yucca and agave, and trees like palms and Joshua trees. While classified differently, these plants share characteristics that help them survive in the rough desert climate. They have a reduction of leaves and alternate water storage options. Many of the plants use extremely long “tap” roots as a mode of adaptation, while others stay close to the surface so they have a better chance to absorb the water before it evaporates.

C. Cactus is one of the plants most associated with deserts. Recognizable by their protective spikes, some species grow flowers and edible fruits. The cactus has adapted exceptionally well to desert conditions. To conserve water, most cacti have a fine root structure in which the roots grow near the surface. Over time they have changed their shape so that their external surface is reduced in relation to their volume. In many types of cacti, the stems have become round or flat and are used instead of green leaves.

D. Deserts are the primary source of table salt, borates, potassium and sodium nitrates and gypsum. Soda, nitrates and boron are the most common minerals that appear only in deserts. Approximately half of the world’s stores of fossil fuels come from desert lands, including oil and natural gas, and about half of the world’s diamonds, copper, gold, iron ore and uranium ore come from the desert as well. Besides, deserts are important because they provide corridors for migration for a number of bird species.

E. Several causes can be attributed to deserts, including the Earth’s air circulation, the rain shadow effect, the distance from the ocean and the proximity of cold ocean currents. The air circulation pattern is one cause that can be explained by the fact that warm air holds more moisture than cold air. This results in the evaporation of water and the formation of deserts. The rain shadow effect occurs to land between two mountain ranges. The rain falls on the other side of the mountains, leaving the land in-between dry.

F. There are 33 major deserts in the world, or 71 when subdivided into smaller deserts. Of those 71, 12 are in Africa, one is Antarctica, three are in the Arctic basin, 26 are in Asia, including the Middle East, 10 are in Australia and New Zealand, 10 are in Europe, four are in North America, and five are in South America. Having less than 10 inches of rain annually, Antarctica is not only classified as a desert, but it is the largest desert. The Sahara in Africa is the largest hot desert.

G. Cold deserts are deserts that experience low temperatures and long winters. They occur in the Arctic, the Antarctic and Greenland, as well as above the tree lines of mountain ranges. Cold deserts tend to have higher precipitation levels than hot deserts, and snowfall is common during winter. Average annual rainfall ranges from 6 to 10 inches. Vegetation is scattered due to poor soil quality, and plants tend to have needle-like leaves that reduce water loss. Native animals include rabbits, pocket mice and foxes.

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1. Why extreme sports are popular

2. Combination of two sports

3. Competition with food

4. Sport or performance?

5. Known to everybody

6. Taken from literature

7. Danger in the snow

8. A skill not used

A. Poohsticks is a sport first mentioned in “The House at Pooh Corner”, a Winnie-the-Pooh book by A. A. Milne. It is a simple sport which may be played on any bridge over running water. Each player drops a stick on the upstream side of a bridge and the one whose stick first appears on the downstream side is the winner. The annual World Poohsticks Championships have been held at Day’s Lock on the River Thames in the UK since 1984.

B. Chess boxing is a hybrid sport that consists of chess and boxing in alternating rounds. The sport was invented by French artist and filmmaker Enki Bilal in his comic book “Froid Equateur” in 1992. The first real event of chess-boxing was organized by Dutch artist Iepe Rubingh in 2003. Chess boxing is a fast growing sport. The sport alternates between games of boxing and chess after each round – waiting for a checkmate or knockout to decide the match.

C. In heliskiing people pay a large sum of money to get helicoptered to a remote snow-covered area only to ski down the white slope. These skiers spend hundreds of dollars to ski down a natural landscape unlike the artificial slopes of a ski-resort. Most obviously, the natural environment involves greater risks and discomfort. Even the journey into the interior part of a mountainous area has often been life-threatening in the past.

D. Cheese rolling is something that has been around for over 200 years and is still practiced today. During the Spring Bank Holiday in England, people gather at the top of Coopers Hill and prepare for something very exciting. At the top of the hill, a judge rolls a round of cheese down the slope and the participants follow. People try to run down the slope but often end up rolling down like the cheese. The winner of the race wins the round of cheese as well as a few bruises and scars.

E. It’s possible that extreme sports became trendy in the late 20th century as a reaction to the greater safety of modern life. Lacking a feeling of danger in their everyday activities, people wanted more excitement or risk. Another reason is improved sports technology. For example, the invention of sticky rubber-soled climbing shoes and artificial climbing walls increased the appeal of rock climbing. And advances in ski design allowed more skiers to try extreme feats.

F. Extreme Ironing is an extreme sport and a performance art. People who play this unusual sport go to a remote location and iron clothes! They call themselves “ironists”, and get a thrill from taking their ironing board, unplugged iron and some of their clothes to some extreme places and photograph themselves doing it. Such places that they have reached include extreme altitude, underwater, hanging from cliffs, and on top of vehicles.

G. Approximately 65 thousand people in the United States alone do not know how to swim. Many of them learned as young children but never go to a pool, lake, river, or ocean anymore and have forgotten how to swim over the years. Others were never taught and continue to avoid the activity altogether. It was once thought that knowing how to swim was important for safety reasons, but now it is pretty much left up to the individual.

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1. Still a mystery

2. Size doesn’t matter

3. Food for the brain

4. Losing to a computer

5. Brain myths

6. Glimpses of history

7. A computer in your head

8. Basic facts

A. The human brain is a very mysterious organ which has interested various scientists all over the world throughout the history of mankind. It is grayish-white in colour and is shaped like a mushroom. The brain is encased in a hard bony structure, called the skull, and weighs about 1.4–1.5 kilograms on average. The brain is comprised of about one hundred billion neurons. These neurons carry and transmit signals through electrochemical processes for our body to function though we don’t feel these processes.

B. This is a stunning human brain fact that it is faster than any computer processor and is quite capable of solving problems more efficiently than gadgets. According to some reports, the master organ can execute up to 10,000,000,000,000,000 tasks per second. In 2015 it took the world’s fourth most powerful supercomputer 40 minutes to perform the functions which the human brain can perform within just one second. This proves that no computer can ever substitute human scientists – at least in the near future.

C. According to some studies, the most beneficial diet for the brain is seafood. It contains fatty acids which can considerably increase brain performance up to 15 percent. Oily fish, for instance, is a good source of omega-3 fatty acids. Omega-3s help build membranes around each cell in the body, including the brain cells, and increase blood flow in the brain. They can, therefore, improve the structure of brain cells called neurons and boost brain function. So, mind what you eat to be clever!

D. The brain is still not fully understood, and its research is ongoing. Neuroscientists, along with researchers from allied disciplines, have been studying how the human brain works for a long time. The boundaries between the specialties of neuroscience, neurology and other disciplines such as psychiatry have faded as they are all influenced by basic research in neuroscience. Still, there are more questions than answers despite all the advances in modern science and scientists’ collective efforts.

E. You may be surprised to find it out, but in fact, the size of the brain and a person’s intelligence are not strongly related. Studies tend to indicate small to moderate correlations (averaging around 0.3 to 0.4) between brain volume and IQ. The most consistent associations have been observed within the frontal, temporal, and parietal lobes, but these only account for a relatively small amount of variance in IQ, which itself has only a partial relationship to general intelligence and real-world performance.

F. Research has disproved some common misconceptions about the brain. These include both ancient and modern ones. For instance, it is not true that neurons are not replaced after the age of two; nor that only 10% of the brain is used. Popular culture has also oversimplified the lateralization of the brain, suggesting that functions are completely specific to one side of the brain or the other. Science fiction books offer even more false stories about the brain.

G. The earliest recorded reference to the brain refers to Egyptian manuscripts of the 17th century BC. The hieroglyph for the brain, occurring eight times in this papyrus, describes the symptoms, diagnosis, and prognosis of two traumatic injuries to the head. In the 5th century BC, the brain was first considered to be the seat of the mind and intelligence. In the Roman Empire scientists studied the brain of monkeys, sheep and other animals and made some important conclusions for that time.

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1. Fun in theory, boring in reality

2. Deficit of activity problems

3. Saving rare animals

4. Contrary to popular belief

5. Benefits of being outdoors

6. Ready to help

7. Original style

8. Similar sounds – different emotions

A. In addition to being highly intelligent, elephants are capable of a remarkable amount of empathy. During a natural disaster, elephants are able to understand that something dangerous is happening. They can understand that a person is in trouble and that the situation is unsafe. Elephants have good sense of smell and there have been cases when they alerted rescuers to people trapped in a building. Elephants have been observed saving their young from drowning and also been filmed trying to save people they see at risk of drowning.

B. A lot of studies suggest that green spaces enhance mental health and learning capacity, both immediately and over time, by lowering stress levels and restoring attention. Greenery restores attention by drawing the eye and at the same time calms the nervous system, creating an ideal state for learning. Similarly, studies show that spending time in the sunlight can reduce attention deficit symptoms, while bright light first thing in the morning can improve mood and the quality of sleep.

C. Why are hyenas known for laughing? There is even a phrase we use: “to laugh like a hyena”. Zoologists will tell you that the unique sounds they make are actually no laughing matter. Hyenas indeed make loud barking noises that sound like laughter, but it’s not because they’re amused by anything. Instead, a hyena’s “laughter” is actually a form of communication used to convey frustration, excitement, or fear. Most often, you’ll hear this unique vocalization during a hunt or when the animals are feeding on prey as a group.

D. Zoologists believe that boredom isn’t a uniquely human emotion – animals can be bored, too. Animals which live in captivity (in zoos, for example) and don’t have to take care of their survival may experience boredom and try to find ways to overcome it. They may come up with some “creative” activities which they wouldn’t normally do in their natural environment. As for the pets at home, they may also suffer from the lack of stimulation. That’s why we need to make sure we give them enough time, attention and toys regularly.

E. While most dogs jump eagerly into the water to swim, cats don’t usually do that, and many believe that cats have a phobia of water. But some pet groomers insist that it’s not true and getting a cat to trust you enough to bathe is quite possible, with some patience and skill. Most cats are not afraid of water like so many people may think. They are actually afraid of loud noises and of drowning, rather than water itself. Cats drink water every day, lots of cats even play with water or follow people into the shower.

F. Videogame testers spend most of their time testing the game long before it’s finished and long before it starts to become a fun experience. Even after the game is developed enough to start being fun, the testing tasks often aren’t entertaining at all. Testers may have to walk their character around a forest, for example, to look for trees that aren’t drawn well. They then record the coordinates so an artist can fix them later. It’s monotonous work and can take days to finish. So if testing video games seems like a fun, easy job to you, think again.

G. Claude Monet’s impressionist paintings were all about nature. In his works he tried to capture nature as it appeared to him at the moment. He also experimented with light and shadow and how they changed during different times of the day. Some artists of the time criticized Monet because his works lacked detail and didn’t resemble finished paintings. Monet used strong colours, which he did not mix. He painted them onto the canvas in short brush strokes. He was also criticized for not using classical painting techniques.

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1. Losing habitat

2. Helping cheetahs

3. Natural surroundings

4. What does a cheetah look like?

5. Sign language

6. Setting speed records

7. Unique hunting habits

8. How can cheetahs speak?

A. Adult cheetahs are, on average, 2.5 feet tall at the shoulder, and up to nearly 5 feet long from head to rump, with their tails adding another 26 to 33 inches. Typically, these large cats weigh between 75 and 140 pounds. Cheetahs have black spots scattered across their tan coats. Their spots are evenly distributed across the body. Cheetahs’ spotted coats help them blend into the environment when resting, stalking prey and hiding from predators. Like a human fingerprint, these markings are unique from cat to cat.

B. Cheetahs’ long, slender bodies, powerful legs and flexible spine enable them to fully stretch their bodies when they sprint and cover significant ground – around 20 to 22 feet per stride. Cheetahs have been known to accelerate from 0 to 45 mph (72 km/h) in just 2.5 seconds. For comparison, the fastest cars in the world can accelerate from 0 to 60 mph (97 km/h) in 3.5 seconds. The fastest a human can run is about 28 mph (45 km/h), which means it’s impossible for a person to outrun a cheetah on foot.

C. Cheetahs are native to Africa and Asia, although the Asiatic cheetah has become all but extinct. According to the African Wildlife Foundation, the large cats currently only inhabit about 10 % of their historic range, and are primarily found in North Africa, the Sahel (the region between the Sahara Desert and the Sudanian savanna), eastern Africa (Kenya and Tanzania), and southern Africa (Namibia and Botswana). A small population also lives in Iran, where they are critically endangered.

D. Cheetahs do not have one home location where they seek shelter day in and day out. Instead, these nomadic cats have home territories or ranges – expanses of grasslands, savannas, forest land and mountainous terrain, ranging from 5 to over 300 square miles (13 to over 780 square kilometres) in size, which they regularly roam, according to the Smithsonian National Zoo. When cheetahs are not actively hunting, they prefer to sleep and rest in tall grasses, under trees, or on rocky outposts.

E. Cheetahs are carnivores, or meat-eaters, whose typical prey are small to medium-size animals, such as birds, hares, warthogs, gazelles and young wildebeest. During daybreak and dusk, cheetahs spend their time stalking and catching prey. Because their teeth are short compared to other big cats, cheetahs do not go for the throat right away in an attack. Instead, they suffocate their prey by clamping down on the animal’s throat with their strong jaws. Despite being carnivores, cheetahs are the shyest of the big cats.

F. Unlike other large cats, cheetahs can’t roar. But they can purr just like cats. Compared with other big cats, such as lions, tigers and leopards, cheetahs have a wide vocabulary. In addition to purring, they are able to produce a large range of vocal cues, such as chirping, hissing, yelping and an “eeaow” sound, which is similar to a cat’s meow. Each vocalization has a specific meaning. Various types of chirping, for example, could be a mother giving instructions to her cubs, or a female trying to attract a male.

G. The cheetahs’ steep population decline is tied to habitat loss, human conflict, illegal trade and poaching. Conservation efforts are underway to try and support the population rebound. Groups, such as the African Wildlife Foundation and the Cheetah Conservation Fund, work locally with communities near cheetah populations to create sustainable solutions for agriculture and population growth, so that both the cats and humans have sufficient space. Protected areas and wildlife parks save cheetahs too.

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1. Life cycle

2. Fascinating facts

3. Distribution and habitat

4. Masters of camouflage

5. Chatty animals

6. Physical features

7. The main threats

8. An economic importance

A. An octopus is a sea animal with eight arms. Octopi live in seas throughout the world. An octopus can change colour quickly depending on its surroundings or its mood. It can be grey, brown, pink, blue, green, or even red if it is suddenly frightened. It can change the colour of its entire body in just three-tenths of a second. But the creature doesn’t simply take on the general pattern of its surroundings. Instead, it often mimics specific undersea objects, like plants or rocks, to disappear into the underwater scenery.

B. Although dolphins look like fish and live in water, they are actually mammals. There are more than 35 species, or types, of dolphins. They are divided into two groups: true dolphins and river dolphins. True dolphins live all over the world in either salt or fresh water. The most widespread species are the common dolphin and the bottlenose dolphin. River dolphins live only in South America and Asia. They prefer freshwater. The Amazon river dolphin is found in the Orinoco and Amazon rivers.

C. Dolphins are known for being intelligent and playful. They use sounds for communication among themselves as members of a school (also called a herd or a pod). Schools may consist of five to several thousand individuals. Often an entire school will function as a unit to accomplish some objective, such as trapping fish. Dolphins have some of the most elaborate acoustic abilities in the animal kingdom. They make a variety of sounds including whistles, clicks, squawks, squeaks, moans, barks, groans and yelps.

D. Unlike most other fish, sharks have skeletons composed of cartilage rather than bone. With a few exceptions, sharks have torpedo-shaped bodies — an efficient, streamlined design for fast-swimming predators. Bottom dwellers tend to be stout and heavy bodied. Sharks normally have tough, grey skin with toothlike scales. Sharks vary in colour from grey to cream, brown, yellow, slate, or blue and are often patterned with spots, bands, or marbling. The whale shark is the largest living fish. It can weigh up to 20 tons.

E. Corals live in all oceans of the world. Reefs are composed of numerous different species of coral. Coral reefs cover less than one percent of the earth’s surface. Certain species of fish spend their life among the corals. Because of the income coming directly from fishing in their waters, reefs provide resources and services worth billions of dollars every year. Millions of people around the world depend on coral reefs for food, protection and employment. These figures are impressive.

F. Corals have barely changed over the last hundred million years. They are the same as they were during dinosaur times. Corals actually comprise an ancient and unique partnership, called symbiosis. Several different types of corals together can form enormous colonies that are called coral reefs. Coral reefs are intriguing things. Coral reefs can grow so large that they can be seen from outer space. Although they only take up a tiny proportion of the world’s ocean, coral reefs contain more than a quarter of all ocean-dwelling creatures.

G. A coral reef is a hard natural structure under the sea that is formed from coral. Coral reefs are some of the most diverse ecosystems in the world. Coral reefs only occupy 0.1% of the area of the ocean but they support 25% of all marine species on the planet. People have long used coral skeletons to make jewelry. But this and other human activities have put many corals at risk. Rising ocean temperatures, oil spills, and chemical pollution harm corals. Boats that sail over reefs may also damage corals.

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1. Figuratively speaking

2. Silver versus gold

3. Key facts

4. Precious doctor

5. Useful in many ways

6. The history of silver

7. Silver symbols

8. Potentially dangerous

A. Silver is a chemical element with the symbol Ag (from the Latin ‘argentum’, meaning ‘shiny’). Its atomic number is 47. Silver is a soft, white metal which exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity and reflectivity of any metal. Silver is found in the Earth’s crust in a pure, free elemental form (the so-called ‘native silver’) together with gold and other metals, and in some minerals. Most silver is produced as a byproduct of copper, gold, or zinc refining.

B. Other than in currency and as an investment medium, silver is used in solar panels, water filtration, jewelry and silverware making, in electrical contacts and conductors, mirrors and so on. You may not know this, but silver is also necessary for window coatings, in the catalysis of chemical reactions, and even as a colorant in stained glass and in specialized confectionery. Its compounds are also used in photographic and X-ray film and making bandages and wound dressings.

 C. In medicine, silver is incorporated into wound dressings and used as an antibiotic coating in medical devices. Wound dressings containing silver are used to treat external infections. Silver is also used in some medical applications, such as catheters and breathing tubes. This is because the silver ion is bioactive and in sufficient concentrations it successfully kills harmful bacteria. Silver compounds are easily taken into the body like mercury, but lack the toxicity of the latter.

D. Silver compounds have low toxicity compared to those of most other heavy metals as they are poorly absorbed by the human body. However, some silver compounds are caustic and can cause stomach and breathing disorders. Animals repeatedly dosed with silver salts have been observed to experience slowed growth and liver and kidney problems. Colloidal silver causes poisoning. Some waterborne species are particularly sensitive to silver salts and those of other precious metals.

E. Silver plays a certain role in mythology and has been used in folklore. Greek poets often used silver to denote somebody or something which is second best. In folklore, silver was commonly thought to have mystical powers. For example, a silver bullet in folk tales is supposed to be the only effective weapon against monsters. In many books, however, silver also represents greed and degradation of consciousness; this is the negative aspect, the unfair treatment of its value.

F. Silver was one of the seven metals that were known to prehistoric humans and whose discovery is thus lost to history. In particular, three metals – copper, silver, and gold – occur in elemental form in nature and were probably used as the first primitive forms of money, as opposed to simple bartering. Since silver is more reactive than gold, supplies of native silver were much more limited than those of gold. For example, silver was more expensive than gold in Egypt.

G. The English language has a lot of phrases and idioms with the word ‘silver’. If a person is very lucky, they say that this person was born with ‘a silver spoon in their mouth’. If you want to encourage somebody who has problems, you may say that ‘every cloud has a silver lining’ and eventually things will turn out fine. You say that ‘speech is silver, but silence is golden’ when you are not happy with somebody’s words. It is certainly interesting to learn about such expressions.

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1. Natural habitat

2. A danger to pandas

3. All of them alike

4. A variety of pandas

5. A food favourite

6. Better alone

7. Conservation issues

8. How do pandas communicate?

A. Giant pandas are bears that are native to China, where they are considered a national treasure. Despite their exalted status, giant panda populations are vulnerable: fewer than 1,900 live in the wild. About 300 live in zoos around the world. When the latest assessment was made in 2014, the population of the giant panda appeared to be increasing. There are 67 panda reserves in China that protect around two thirds of giant pandas in the wild and more than 50% of the giant panda’s habitat, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

B. For many years, scientists wondered whether pandas were a type of bear, raccoon or something all their own. But plenty of genetic studies have made it clear that pandas are a type of bear. Also called great pandas, parti-coloured or bamboo bears, giant pandas are distinguished from other pandas by their large size and black-and-white colouring. Their bold colouring provides camouflage, as a result, giant pandas are nearly invisible in dense patches of bamboo, according to the Smithsonian National Zoo.

C. A giant panda’s appetite for bamboo is insatiable. Bamboo is relatively low in nutrients, that is why pandas have to eat much of it. In order to get a variety of nutrients, pandas eat various parts of the bamboo plant and will seek out bamboo that is sprouting new shoots and leaves as they contain higher amounts of nutrients at different times of the year. Sometimes there is not enough bamboo around to sustain large bears, so giant pandas will occasionally supplement their diet with rodents, fish, insects or birds.

D. In the wild, giant pandas are only found in the remote, mountainous regions of central China, in Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu provinces, according to the National Zoo. In these areas, between 5,000 and 10,000 feet elevation, there are cool, wet bamboo forests that serve as home for giant pandas. The large bears make their dens from hollowed-out logs or stumps of conifer trees found within the forest. In the summer, giant pandas will climb 13,000 feet up the mountains of their home area to feed.

E. For the most part, giant pandas are loners. They dislike being around other pandas so much that they have a heightened sense of smell that lets them know when another panda is nearby so it can be avoided, according to the National Geographic. If they do come in contact with one another, they will growl, swat and bite each other until one gives up and leaves. On average, the giant panda’s territory is about 1.9 square miles (5 square kilometres), which is large enough to avoid unwilling contacts.

F. Pandas are the most vocal of all bear species, according to the San Diego Zoo. A bleat, similar to the sound of a lamb or a goat kid would make, is one of the most distinctive vocalizations of the giant panda, and is typically used as a greeting. Other vocalizations include honks, huffs, barks and growls, while cubs often croak and squeal. Giant pandas are known to be noisy, curious and playful. Even in captivity, they are often found playing noisily with enrichment items, such as toys and puzzles.

G. The giant panda is considered vulnerable to extinction under the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. One of the main threats to the giant panda’s survival is the population of feral dogs that roam the forests where pandas live. Packs of dogs will hunt pandas. Even if dogs do not succeed in killing a panda, they can transfer diseases to the bears. These large bears are not particularly agile or swift creatures, so their primary escape route is up. If they can’t make it up a tree, they will get injured or killed.

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1. Mad about ponies

2. A great imitation

3. Fairy-tale horses

4. The origin of horses

5. From a job to a sport

6. Figuratively speaking

7. Horses treating kids

8. The importance of horses

A. The horse is a large animal which was domesticated about 5,000 years ago. Now it’s impossible to imagine our life without horses. There are more than 300 different breeds and 60 million horses in the world today that are used as working animals (to pull the ploughs in the field and transport heavy loads), for racing, competitions and shows, for recreation and so on. In the USA alone, 4.6 million Americans work in the horse industry which earns 39 billion dollars per year.

B. Rodeo is a very popular competitive sport which developed from horse farming in Mexico and later continued in many other countries. It came out of the daily practices and tasks performed by ranch workers who spent long hours with horses. Actually, a rodeo is based on the skills required of the working cowboys. Now it is a professional sport that consists of several events organized to show the skill and speed of the participants, cowboys and even cowgirls.

C. With The American Rodeo computer game you’ll find yourself right in the middle of the rodeo arena. Finally here is a chance for you to try this sport with this incredibly realistic new software. The horse will start jumping when you press the "GO" button. Your task in this game is to keep the rider on the horse all the time until the end of the game, otherwise you lose. Of course, you can replay as many times as you want, just fix the mouse cursor on the rider’s body as long as you can.

D. Children with certain health or behavioral problems often have a low self-esteem and difficulties connecting with other people. Sometimes they are also unable to express their feelings. Working with a horse is an effective way for such children to work through some of their problems because it’s easy for kids to project their own needs onto an animal, to tell their own stories from an animal’s point of view, and then to be able to find healthier solutions to their personal problems.

E. My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is a children’s animated fantasy TV series based on Hasbro’s line of toys and animated works. Its creative director Lauren Faust managed to create attractive characters and adventurous settings that are now loved by girls all over the world. The main character is the unicorn pony named Twilight Sparkle and she learns about friendship in the town of Ponyville with five other ponies. The series has become a major commercial success with kids.

F. As My Little Pony series became the most highly rated original production in the Hub Network’s broadcast history, it opened new merchandising opportunities for Hasbro. Now girls go crazy about anything with an image of the cartoon characters on it – books, clothing, collectible trading cards, puzzles, and comics. Mind you, anything with a picture of Pinkie Pie or Applejack on it will be much more expensive than the regular thing, but this doesn’t stop either kids or their parents.

G. People domesticated horses so long ago that it’s no wonder we have so many idiomatic expressions with the word horse in many languages of the world. English is certainly not an exception here. For instance, if you are flogging a dead horse, it means you are wasting your time trying to do something when it is impossible. A dark horse is a candidate that is unknown to the public or a person who surprises people by doing something that they do not expect. It’s fun to learn such phrases.

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1. Pluses and minuses

2. Difficult to prove

3. Strategy for success

4. Choosing one’s lifestyle

5. Why they win

6. Useful signs

7. Genre differences

8. Fresh start

A. What sets a musical and an opera apart is that in opera, music is the driving force; in musical theatre, words come first. While listening to an opera, it usually doesn’t matter what language it’s sung in if you know the basic plot – but in musical theatre, the details come from the lyrics. This explanation clarifies why opera stars often sing in a different style than Broadway performers do, why operas and musicals are typically about different subjects, and why musical composition and orchestration vary between the two disciplines.

B. When the Internet was invented, nobody really thought about security. The main aim was to connect computer networks over great distances. Although a lot of money have been spent on making the Internet safer, security has actually become worse. Experts say that the whole net has become so unsafe that it would be best to start all over again. Nobody knows what a new Internet would look like but users would have to give up their anonymity for a bit more safety. Today’s Internet might end up as a bad neighbourhood you just wouldn’t pass through.

C. In the past decades African runners have dominated marathons all over the world. The Ethiopian Abebe Bikila ran barefoot to his first gold medal in the 1960 Olympic Games. He repeated his victory four years later. Experts think that African runners are better because they train in higher places in their home countries. Their legs may also be stronger than ours and they may have the ability to collect and store more oxygen. All of these help them become very good runners.

D. Watching TV shows is a great way to learn spoken English, slang words, understand culture reference and humour. However, people on TV shows sometimes speak with grammar mistakes, which is often a part of character development. Characters talk with an accent, using non-standard English and pronouncing words in a way that is difficult to understand. While it is a great way to practice listening and talking in everyday life, it is probably not a good source for “proper English”.

E. When you are running a marathon it is very important to drink a lot so that your body does not dehydrate. You should run at a steady pace. Don’t start too fast or you will become tired very quickly and won’t be able to continue. This is called “hitting the wall”. In most cases runners then give up completely. On the other hand, you shouldn’t start too slowly or else you won’t reach the time limit you want to achieve. After a marathon most runners feel pain in their muscles. This is normal and it may take a few days before your body becomes normal again.

F. In ancient times, people could only use the power of observation to tell what the weather would bring. They could observe the changing patterns of the seasons. This taught them when to plant and when the crops would grow. People also observed animals and the growing cycles of plants to predict changes in the weather. They could tell when a rainy season was coming and when it would get cold. People used their senses to see and smell changes in the weather. The migration of animals was also a good indication of change.

G. It is not clear who was the first to reach the North Pole. A US explorer called Frederick Cook insisted on having walked there in 1908, but nobody could support his claim. Another American called Robert Peary announced that he had reached the Pole in 1909, but because his men were not trained navigators, none of them could be sure. Because the Arctic is made of ice that floats on the sea, rather than snow and ice on rock like the Antarctic, any evidence of visiting the North Pole will quickly be swallowed up by water.