BBC Education Programme
August 2016(Student’s copy / Upper Secondary)
Article: Can We Build a Human?
From pg 32-41
1. Inferential
Why are teams racing to create the first replica of a human brain?
(1m)
2. Language/Rephrasing Question
What inferences can be drawn from studying human connectomes and brain mapping? (2m)
3. Inferential Question
How can researchers reanimate life into prosthetic or electronic limbs?
(2m)
4. Language/ Inferential Question
Bioprinters are able to recreate human tissue
(a) Give TWO processes in how they can recreate the human tissue
(b) Give ONE difficulty in transplanting such tissues and organs into the body.
(2m)
(1m)
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5. Vocabulary Question
What reference to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is highlighted in the quest for reanimating life?
(1m)
6. Evaluative Question
What evidence does the writer give for the difficulties in allowing “the splash of life”?
(1m)
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Crossword Puzzle
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EclipseCrossword.com
Across
4.
6.
9.
10.
Give new energy or strength to.
Highly destructive or damaging.
Showing or involving great activity or vitality.
Put at risk of being harmed, injured, or destroyed.
Down
1.
2.
3.
5.
7.
8.
The tidal mouth of a large river, where the tide meets the stream.
A part, share, or number considered in comparative relation to a whole.
An indicator of the presence of disease.
The central principle or part of a policy, system, etc., on which all else depends.
Beautiful in a dramatic and eye-catching way.
A hindrance or obstruction in doing something.
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Comprehension Cloze
For questions 21-30, choose the answer closest in meaning to the underlined words in the
passage.
The Eskimo had lived on the coasts of Baffin Island for the last 4000 years or so.
Although a European, Martin Frobisher, 21.seeking gold and a new route to China,
reached the south coast if Baffin Island in 1576, Europeans had little 22.influence on the
Eskimo’s way of life until the mid-nineteenth century. The Eskimo continued, as he had for
thousands of years before, to manage to live in one of the 23.remotest parts of the world,
hunting with weapons made of bone, living in snow houses for tents of skin, while his
clothes were made from skin and furs. He had neither metal nor wood, and depended 24.
entirely on flesh, fat and bones of animals he could catch from the Arctic sea of land in
order to survive.
During these years the Eskimos 25.develop dwellings and clothing for living in the
Arctic cold that, even using modern scientific knowledge, no one has so far been able to
do better. Living in small groups of either one or several families, he 26.provided all his
own needs. The leader of a group used to be its best hunter, and each person had his own
job to do: the short-sighted did the 27.unskilled tasks; the women cooked and made
clothes. Within the group everyone had a fair share of its produce.
Europeans came in increasing the numbers in the second half of the nineteenth
century to hunt whales. They also began 28. trading with the Eskimo, giving him metal
cooking pots, guns and cloth in return for skins, and adding tea, sugar and flour to the
meat, which had formerly been almost his only food.
The Eskimo came to rely more and more on these new goods from abroad, but still
did not change his way of life in any 29. important way. He still lived in small groups in the
best hunting areas, still lived off the land. His life was certainly a hard one, and if he was
careless or unlucky, his family could die of hunger. He also suffered from diseases,
especially germs 30.introduced by the Europeans, and whole groups were killed off
21. a. looking for
b. searching for
c. finding for
d. asking for
22. a. clout
b. effect
c. impact
d. consequence
23. a. most distant
b. most far away
c. isolated
d. lonely
24. a. completely
b. totally
c. exclusively
d. solely
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25. a. progress
b. bring forth
c. build
d. grow
26.
a. contributed
b. equipped
c. catered
d. supplied
27. a. illiterate
b. incompetent
c. unspecialised
d unprofessional
28. a. buying
b. selling
c. exchanging
d. sharing
29. a. vital
b. crucial
c. essential
d. necessary
30. a. created
b. presented
c. recommended
d. initiated
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Editing
Adapted from Robert Matthews - The Statistics Crisis
Carefully read the text below, the first and last lines are correct.
For each paragraph, there is at least one grammatical error. Some lines do not contain any errors.
If there is NO error in a line, put a tick ( / ) in the space provided.
If the line is incorrect, circle the incorrect word and write the correct word in the space provided.
The correct word you provide must not change the original meaning of the sentence.
The chance that someone with a brain tumour gets recurrent
headaches are over 50 per cent. So if you get recurrent headaches ,
the chances you’ve got a brain tumour is also around 50 per cent,
right?
Wrong, of course, but could you say why? It’s because the argument
assumes the chances of A given B are identical with the chances of B
given A.
You can’t flip probabilities over like that. The problem lies in a
statistical technique known as “significance testing”. Put simply, that
allows statistics researchers to work out the chances of getting at
least as impressive results as they did, assuming which just fluke
were responsible.
The trouble is , generations of researchers have then flipped the
result over, believing it reveals the chances of their breakthrough
actually been a fluke
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Great Openings for Narrative Essays
What questions spring to mind when you read such openings?
A) The inventors of 'Supaglue' may not have anticipated the use to which I would put their
product.
B) It was lunchtime and we were all sitting under the white canopy of the dining-tent pretending
that nothing had happened.
C) The sky above the sea port was the colour of television, tuned to a dead channel.
Now it’s your turn. Can you come up with a one sentence opening in 7 mins to a personal recount
titled “Frying an egg”?
What other writers say about the importance of a good opening:
I want to …persuade (my readers) that this road is interesting, one of ultimate promise. My
job (first) is to ensure they reach (and want to read) the second paragraph, that the second
begets the third and that the whole of the (recount) is strong enough to quiet the TV and
block out the conversations around.
Alex Keegan
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I've been thinking a lot about opening sentences recently. The book I'm writing at the moment
started because one day this whole sentence came into my head –
"I've never told this story to anyone because when I was 11 I swore an oath in blood never
to tell it."
I liked the sentence - it intrigued me and it posed all sorts of questions:
What happened when this person was 11?
Who did he swear the oath with?
Why can he tell it now?
From that one opening sentence I kept asking questions and coming up with answers. I have now
written 75,000 words of a book!
You need something to fire the imagination of readers. Make the reader want to know what
happens next - something that pulls them into the story. Makes them ask questions- who is this,
what's happening, what's going to happen?
We are not really looking for scene setting or character establishment. It's about grabbing the
reader - a bit like saying to your best mate - "hey - you'll never guess what happened to me last
night." They're bound to say "what???"
Nigel Hinton.
Something Imaginative
One of the best opening sentences I know is from George Orwell's book '1984':"It was a bright cold
day in April and the clocks were striking 13."
There's a great balance to that sentence - the first half seems ordinary and reassuring and then,
bang, he hits you with the twist. Clocks striking 13 - what kind of world is this?
The reader has to think:
“What’s going on here?”
“What’s going to happen next?”
“Why did such and such happen?”
“When did it happen?”
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