IELTS Academic Reading Practice Test 7 with Answers

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IELTS Academic Reading Practice Test 7 with Answers | TV | Spelling System Reform | Perfume

Reading Passage 1

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13 which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.

Questions 1-5

Reading Passage 1 has 9 paragraphs A-I.
From the List of headings below choose the 5 most suitable headings for paragraphs B, C, D, E and F.
Write the appropriate numbers (i-x).

NB There are more headings than paragraphs, so you will not use them all.

List of Headings

i. A convenient and cost-effective solution
ii. Encouraging audience participation
iii. The backup technology
iv. Tailoring the service
v. Success brought by interactive software
vi. The features of the new platform
vii. Synchronization and connectivity
viii. The application server
ix. The Mobile Interactive TV Platform
x. Different market segmentation

1. Paragraph B
2. Paragraph C
3. Paragraph D
4. Paragraph E
5. Paragraph F

TV

A.
Interactive production company Two Way TV has been commissioned by ITV Play to create a unique new programming strand, Play DJ. Play DJ features a number of Play-along SMS games, produced using Two Way TV’s unique Simcast text-to-TV platform. William van Rest, Controller of ITV Play, said: “Play DJ is a little bit different from the traditional quiz TV formats, contributing to our aim of moving the sector on. It has a unique blend of entertainment and game play which we hope will build up a loyal following”.

B.
Broadcasters, programme-makers and TV networks now have the widest ever range of interactive TV and mobile to TV products and services available. With interactive software solutions, TV networks like ITV and BBC Channel 4 have succeeded in designing and building many of flagship services including Pop Idol, The Premiership and Big Brother. More recently, Two Way TV helped ITV go interactive on cable TV for the first time with X Factor and This Morning.

C.
The sudden surge in the number of interactive TV platforms clearly demonstrates that viewers are enjoying participating in voting, quizzes and other interactive activities using their mobile phones. The “getting the audience involved” experience lets viewers interact with one another or with content associated with reality shows, regular shows, or advertisements by sending in messages that are displayed or accumulated on the television screen. They can answer questions, cast votes or predict what’s about to happen on screen. The voting and response services utilize the mobile phone of the TV viewer to interactively and directly participate in what’s happening on TV-simply by sending his vote or SMS message to a premium number during the broadcast of the TV programme. The solution can analyze up to 6,000 SMS per second and provides an easy-to , p p y use web-based administration tool to track and manage the SMS and MMS traffic. It also generates graphical results that bring value to the show and act as a compulsive element for audience participation.

The primary technological underpinnings of the new platform are an application server, located in the service provider’s computer center, and a broadcasting system installed at the broadcaster’s central control station. The application server provides web-based tools for the moderation and selection of SMS and MMS messages, and its graphical user interface (GUI) enables screen design and control of the programme. In addition, the server provides all the interface connections with SMS and MMS gateways, as well as with mobile operators’ billing systems. The broadcasting system, meanwhile, creates the video signals for TV broadcast, and otters interfaces with programme planning tools, video servers, and text and graphics generators.

E.
Whereas the market was previously characterized by closed, proprietary platforms that offered broadcasters only one limited alternative and necessitated using different platforms for different applications, the new platform, differentiated in the marketplace by p , p y its open and modular approach, enables numerous applications, and provides interfaces for the seamless integration of games and TV formats from third- party providers. The differences between mobile interactive TV platform and other technologies in the market add up to this; fast and easy creation, delivery, integration, and management of rich media interactive TV applications into live or prerecorded programs. The Mobile Interactive TV Platform allows broadcasters to integrate interactive services into their TV programme. Broadcasters merely have to select the desired services from the platform. Applications, like SMS2TV. MMS2TV, games, chats or votings, can be used in any combination. The production phase of interactive TV applications should not require costly programming and specialist technical knowledge. The TV programme can be arranged individually by means of a userfriendly graphical user interface. A suite of software and hardware is available that delivers multimode applications for broadcasters and other application service providers.

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F.
The mobile platform offers convenience and a cost-effective solution to the broadcaster, while putting great emphasis on reliability. Its key features include a provisioning environment, synchronization of diverse media while supporting mass interactions by many viewers supporting mass interactions by many viewers to the same TV application in a real-time mode, enabling the easy creation of TV applications, the production of very low-cost TV applications, and a high degree of connectivity to external interfaces. These features are ideal for media owners who want to reach users regardless of their public network provider. They give a fast and reliable platform for processing high volume traffic, seamless connections to communication networks and to the broadcast control room, an “invisible” dynamic and flexible billing system and an interactive “back channel” (an immediate, “always-on” channel through which users can respond or receive messages in any format: SMS, MMS, ringtones, icons, etc.).

G.
This is a real end-to-end solution tying all the knots needed to create a show that gather information from a magnitude of diverse media, while handling aspects of accounting, connecting to all kinds of cellular networks, supplying scalable and robust configurations, and referring to third parties for purposes of playing for real money, raising donations, and even selling services and products.

H.
For these reasons texting and other user interactions in response to television fl l programming or to influence television programming have gained a lot of popularity lately. Next-generation television services that focus on interactivity are most likely to find success in Spain, the UK and Japan, with the US ranking sixth in a study that examines the digital readiness of 12 countries for interactive and personalized television services. In Spain, nearly 80% of those surveyed showed an interest in at least one key advanced television offering, especially those related to interactive features such as personalized recommendations and voting. In both the UK and Japan, 75% showed an inclination towards interactive services.

I.
“Different populations have quite unique reactions to an interest in applications regarding advanced TV services,” said Deepa Iyer, research analyst at Parks Associates. “Consumers in the United Kingdom are more inclined toward interactive features such as voting abilities whereas the Japanese prefer features such as personalized recommendations and one-button access capabilities. “The ‘ one size fits all’ mind-set regarding television services is obsolete,” Iyer said. “The challenge is to meet the broadcaster’s needs quickly, limiting the amount of time required to make a broadcast-quality product and to allow all the viewers to participate.”

Questions 6-9

Matching the following descriptions as referring to

A. SMS
B. GUI
C. Back Channel
D. The Application Server
E. The Mobile Interactive TV Platform

6. It provides a passage though which users receive and send messages.
7. It enables screen design and control of the programme.
8. It provides web-based tools to select messages.
9. It enables broadcasters to combine interactive services with their TV programmes.

Questions 10-13

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 1?
In boxes 10-13 on your answer sheet write

TRUE, if the statement is true
FALSE, if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN, if the information is not given in the passage.

10. The Japanese market calls for more promotional messaging.
11. The United States was among the first countries to implement Two Way TV
12. Texting is just one form of user interface
13. UK consumers prefer conventional TV, as they are a more passive audience

Reading Passage 2

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14 — 27 which are based on Reading Passage 2 below.

SPELLING SYSTEM REFORM

A.
Our children are being beaten up by a crazy spelling system that appears to be loved by millions. They are being beaten up because they are constantly bombarded by unpredictable silent letters, double consonants that defy explanation, endless varieties of vowel combinations, and rules that are notoriously unreliable. They are forced to attempt to learn a system that is illogical, inconsistent, and — system that is illogical, inconsistent, and — worst of all — needlessly complicated. Not only are they physically beaten up. but many of them do end up with well-concealed scars on their psyches. At least one study has shown that using a system as irrational as ours may arrest the development of logical thinking. That’s not just being beating up; it’s child abuse exactly.

B.
There’s a social stigma attached to being a poor speller, although the only thing being a good speller makes one better at is spelling. It doesn’t make one a better writer, a better poet, a more creative person with words. it doesn’t make him understand the essence of the language better. Shakespeare would have been the exact same creative genius he was whether he was a good or bad speller. He was just lucky enough to have lived in a day when he was judged by the meaning of his words, rather than the placement of the letters within those words. In Shakespeare’s day, most people’s spelling was erratic; therefore, when he spelled words many different ways no one even noticed.

During the last 30 years or so, literacy in the English-speaking world has been declining at an alarming rate. It’s not hard to guess why. During the rapid development of electronics in the past 40 years speech for the first time in the entire years, speech, for the first time in the entire course of history, has become a mass medium. The people, having discovered those electronic channels through which they can receive Information in their own language, are now circumventing the outdated writing system which has been the bottleneck in mass communication. And having alienated themselves from it, they have become less able and less willing to cope with its irrational complexities. In an attempt to correct this situation, the Federal Government of the United States initiated its “Decade of the ’70’s” program. During that ten-year period, both State and Federal governments have poured massive sums into programs designed to eradicate illiteracy not by re designing the outdated writing system, but by attempting to shape the minds of human beings into conformity with the system. This extravagant program achieved nothing. The drift to illiteracy continues as before, except that it now has reached the proportions of a crisis. For example, the United States Navy now complains that from 40% to 50% of today’s recruits can’t read the instruction manuals. The Navy is plainly worried about the future. And they are not alone.

D.
The problem in the English-speaking world is that the writing system has been shaped a bit, here and there. In the direction of Modern English, but the fact is that its spelling is based primarily on another language. Middle English, which hasn’t been spoken in at least 400 years, and is no longer understood. From the point of view of a technician, this problem is easily solved. All one needs to do is to design a writing system specifically for Modern English, so that all three elements in the chain of communication can function in harmony. The proposal is that we systematically and definitively wipe out all the anomalous spellings in English so that anyone looking at a word in print will immediately know how to pronounce it — and, conversely, anyone attempting to write English will be able to get every single spelling right the first time. In other words, proponents of English spelling reform want us to adopt a mostly phonetic orthography. Indeed, a certain amount of reform has happened all by itself over the years, as previously alternative spellings have worked their way into the dictionary as standard forms. Think of the word “catalog” , which was formerly spelled “catalogue” , or “draft” , formerly spelled “draught”.

E.
On a relatively small scale, sensible spellings do sometimes replace less sensible ones. But the design of a new writing system is only a partial solution. The major obstacle that confronts the orthographic reformer is the existing system itself, which, with all its scandalous lack of utility, happens to be an Investiture that seems to defy displacement. The first question that arises is how far such a reform would go. We could make a good start by simply removing letters that are never pronounced. Though could become tho, guard could become gard, foreign could become forin, doubt could become dout, Christmas could become Chrismas, and so on. We could also, perhaps, reduce the number of ways to write any particular sound — so the “ee” sound in street, for example, might always be written “ee” , never “ea ” , ” ie” , “ei” , “i” , “e”, or whatever. Although these changes would help, however, they would save only a subset of the problems — and the more extensive the changes are, the more difficult they would be for the public to accept.

F.
Since we’ve already programmed our brains to work under the current, flawed system simplified spellings would be at least initially — much harder for all the hundreds of millions of English readers to read. There’s also that little matter of what to do with the billions of books, magazines, web sites, and other documents that already use the “old” spelling. Then there are those who point out that a word’s spelling gives important clues to its etymology, meaning, and relationship to other words. So even though the “a” in the word real is not pronounced, It serves the important function of showing the word’s connection to the word ” reality” , in which the ” a ” is pronounced. Lose that letter, and the words no longer appear to have anything to do with each other. Thus, at least some of the peculiarities of English spelling exist for entirely legitimate, and still useful, historical reasons.

Sir Winston Churchill opposed a spelling reform bill in British parliament in 1949. He felt that changing the appearance of words would “mess up the language of Shakespeare” If Mr. Churchill had understood the detrimental effect that needlessly complex spelling has on literacy, he would have realized that unreformed spelling ruins the language of Shakespeare because it prevents an extra 10% of the population from being literate enough to read t. That may be too high a price to pay.

Questions 14 — 20

Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 2?
In boxes 14-20 on your answer sheet write

TRUE, if the statement is true
FALSE, if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN, if the information is not given in the passage.

14. The presence of unpronounced letters sometimes serves to connect meanings of words.
15. Some people already used new spelling systems to write books and magazines.
16. The problem lies not with the system of spelling but with the method of teaching.
17. Simplified spelling would not be immediately successful because we have grown accustomed to the flawed system.
18. The current spelling system may hinder children from developing logical thinking
19.The program initiated by the Federal Government aimed at eliminating illiteracy.
20. Shakespeare was both a good writer and speller

Questions 21-23

Complete the sentences below USING NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS taken from the passage.

21. Spelling reform is based on an essentially _____ orthography
22.The spelling system we use today has a _____ effect on people’s literacy.
23. Churchill feared that a spelling reform hill would _____ the language of Shakespeare.

Questions 24-27

Match the following statements with their example word.

A. self-change over time
B. limited way to write
C. unpronounced letter
D. unpronounced letter works

24. real
25. Christmas
26. catalogue
27. street

Reading Passage 3

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 28-40, which are based on Reading Passage 3 below.

PERFUME

A.
Perfume comes from the Latin “per” meaning “through” and “fumum” , or “smoke”. Many ancient perfumes were made by extracting natural oils from plants through pressing and steaming. The oil was then burned to scent the air. Since the beginning of recorded history, humans have attempted to mask or enhance their own odor by using perfume, which emulates nature’s pleasant smells. Many natural and man-made materials have been used to make perfume to apply to the skin and clothing, to put in cleaners and cosmetics, or to scent the air. Because of differences in body chemistry, temperature, and body odors, no perfume will smell exactly the same on any two people.

B.
Before perfumes can be composed, the odorants used in various perfume compositions must first be obtained. Synthetic odorants are produced through organic synthesis and purified. Odorants from natural sources require the use of various methods to extract the aromatics from the raw materials Enfleurage a process from the raw materials. Enfleurage, a process that uses odorless fats that are solid at room temperature to capture the fragrant compounds exuded by plants, is the oldest of fragrance extraction techniques. The process can be “cold” enfleurage or “hot” enfleurage. In cold enfleurage, a large framed plate of glass, called a chassis, is smeared with a layer of animal fat, usually from pork or beef, and allowed to set. Botanical matter, usually petals or whole flowers, is then placed on the fat and its scent is allowed to diffuse into the fat over the course of 13 days. The process is then repeated by replacing the spent botanicals with fresh ones until the fat has reached a desired degree of fragrance saturation.

In hot enfleurage, solid fats are heated and botanical matter is stirred into the fat. Spent botanicals are repeatedly strained from the fat and replaced with fresh material until the fat is saturated with fragrance. In both instances, the fragrance-saturated fat is now called the “enfleurage pomade”. The enfleurage pomade is washed or soaked in ethyl alcohol to draw the fragrant molecules into the alcohol. The alcohol is then separated from the fat and allowed to evaporate, leaving behind the essential oil of the botanical matter. The spent fat is usually used to make soaps since it is still relatively fragrant. This method of fragrance extraction is by far one of the oldest. It is also highly inefficient and costly but was the sole method of extracting the fragrant compounds in delicate floral botanical such as jasmine and tuberose, which would be destroyed or denatured by the high temperatures required by methods of fragrance extraction such as steam distillation. The method is now superseded by more efficient techniques such as solvent extraction or supercritical fluid extraction using liquid carbon dioxide (CO2) or similar compressed gases.

D.
The results of the extraction are either essential oils, absolutes, concretes, or butters, depending on the amount of waxes in the extracted product. All these techniques will to a certain extent, distort the odour of the aromatic compounds obtained from the raw materials. This is due to the use of heat, harsh solvents, or through exposure to oxygen in the extraction process which will denature the aromatic compounds, which either change their odour character or renders them odourless. The country-island Madagascar—known for its extremely unique biodiversity—is recognized as holding tremendous potential for the development of new products in the essential oils, cosmetic and body care, due to the fact that 80% of its flora and fauna is endemic—meaning so unique that they are found nowhere else in the world.

E.
For 85 million years, the flora and fauna of Madagascar evolved in isolation from the rest of the world. Examples of the totally unique essential oils and botanicals from Madagascar include the Ravinsara leaf known for its aroma, spice and therapeutic applications. Aromatherapists believe that the oil can travel deep into muscle tissues and joints. Some have suggested that the oil has antiviral properties, and it is thought to relieve rheumatism and joint inflammation. Another totally unique essential oil from Madagascar to relieve rheumatic pains is Katrafay, which is also used in Madagascar by women after giving birth as a fortifier and tonic. It is also believed to have anti-inflammatory properties. Cinnamosma fragrans is used traditionally as a decoction for treatment of malarial symptoms. The essential oil is used for tired and aching muscles.

F.
According to suppliers, there are quite a few other high quality aromatherapy oils produced in Madagascar. These include niaouli used for clearing, cleansing and mental stimulation; lantana camara used for flu, colds, coughs, fevers, yellow fever, dysentery and jaundice; ylang-ylang used as an aphrodisiac; cinnamon (bark and leaf) used to destroy microbes and bacteria, and holding promise for people with diabetes; tamanu (Calophyilum inophyllum) used to treat skin ailments; wild orange petit grains, used as a lively and soothing fragrance and to relieve dry skin; a unique ginger (fresh) oil used for circulation, aching muscles and nausea; and clove bud oil, which has been utilized as a local anesthetic in dentistry, as a food preservative and as on alternative to Deet.

G.
Because perfumes and essential oils depend heavily on harvests of plant substances and the availability of animal products, perfumery can often turn risky. Thousands of flowers are needed to obtain just one pound of essential oils, and if the season’s crop is destroyed by disease or adverse weather, perfumeries could be in jeopardy. In addition, consistency is hard to maintain in natural oils. The same species of plant raised in several different areas with slightly different growing conditions may not yield oils with exactly the same scent. Problems are also encountered in collecting natural animal oils. Many animals once killed for the value of their oils are on the endangered species list and now cannot be hunted. For example, sperm whale products like ambergris have been outlawed since 1977. Also, most animal oils in general are difficult and expensive to extract. Deer musk must come from deer found in Tibet; civet cats, bred in Ethiopia, are kept for their fatty gland secretions; beavers from Canada and the former Soviet Union are harvested for their castor. Synthetic perfumes have allowed perfumers more freedom and stability in their craft, even though natural ingredients are considered more desirable in the very finest perfumes. The use of synthetic perfumes and oils eliminates the need to extract oils from animals and removes the risk of a bad plant harvest, saving much expense and the lives of many animals.

Questions 28-30

The flowchart below demonstrates the cold enfleurage method of fragrance extraction.
Complete the flowchart with NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each blank from the passage.

Questions 31-34
Do the following statements agree with the information given in Reading Passage 3?
In boxes 31-34 on your answer sheet write;

TRUE, if the statement is true
FALSE, if the statement is false
NOT GIVEN, if the information is not given in the passage.

31. Synthetic perfumes outweigh natural counterparts in all aspects.
32. The fragrance of jasmine can he extracted by employing the method of steam distillation.
33. Nowadays, the biggest industry of Madagascar is perfumery.
34. The original Latinal meaning of perfume is the scent smoke.

Questions 35-39

Use the information in the passage to match the essential oils listed (A — F) with their purposes.
Write the appropriate letter (A— F) in boxes 34- 39 on your answer sheet.

A. Katralay
B. Clove bud oil
C. Ylang-ylang
D. Cinnamon
E. Lantana caniara
F. Ginger oil

35. used as postpartum tonic
36. used as medicine for influenza
37. used as medicine for diabetes
38. used as medicine for nausea
39. used as anesthetic medicine

Question 40

List three kinds of protected animals whose oils are highly valued. Write NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS for each blank.
___________________
___________________
___________________

Also Check: IELTS Academic Reading Practice Test 6 with Answers