Buổi 148: Thi thử cuối khóa – Listening + Reading (80 câu)

A town without cars

(Bài đọc tự viết; thị trấn, nhân vật và số liệu là giả định.)

A When the small town of Ravenmoor closed its historic centre to private cars eight years ago, many local shopkeepers predicted disaster. They argued that customers would simply drive to out-of-town shopping centres instead, and that businesses in the centre would close. A campaign group collected signatures against the plan, and the local newspaper ran several articles predicting that the town would become a “ghost town”.

B The council went ahead nonetheless, introducing the change in stages. First, the main square was closed to traffic on Saturdays only. After a year, the restriction was extended to every day, and two car parks were built on the edge of the centre, linked to the main square by a free electric shuttle bus. Delivery vehicles are still permitted, but only before ten in the morning.

C The results so far have surprised many of the plan’s critics. According to the council, footfall – the number of people walking through the centre – has risen steadily, and several empty shops have reopened as cafés and independent stores. Air quality in the square has improved, and the council reports that road accidents in the centre have fallen sharply.

D Not everyone has benefited equally. Some older residents say they find it harder to reach the centre, particularly if they have difficulty walking from the shuttle stop. A few businesses that relied on customers buying heavy goods, such as a hardware store, have moved to locations with parking. The council has responded by introducing a booking service that allows residents with limited mobility to request a door-to-door electric vehicle.

E Planners from other towns have visited Ravenmoor to learn from its experience. The council’s transport officer, Gemma Holt, warns against copying the plan without adapting it. She believes the scheme worked partly because the centre was compact and already attractive to walk around, and because the changes were introduced gradually, giving people time to adjust.

Why do we yawn?

(Bài đọc tự viết; các nhà nghiên cứu là giả định; các giả thuyết trình bày ở mức phổ thông.)

A Yawning is one of the most familiar human behaviours, yet its purpose remains surprisingly uncertain. People yawn when they are tired, when they are bored, and sometimes simply because they have seen someone else do so. Several explanations have been proposed, but none has been accepted by all researchers.

B One long-standing idea is that yawning increases the amount of oxygen in the blood. This explanation is still widely repeated, but Dr Helen Park, a physiologist, argues that it is not well supported. In her view, if yawning were mainly about oxygen, people would yawn more when oxygen levels were low, and evidence for this is weak.

C A more recent hypothesis suggests that yawning may help to cool the brain. The physiologist Dr Marco Rossi points out that a deep intake of air, combined with stretching of the jaw, could increase blood flow and bring cooler air into contact with the body. He notes that, in some observations, people seem to yawn less often when the surrounding air is very hot, which he believes is consistent with a cooling function – though he accepts that more research is needed.

D The fact that yawning is contagious has attracted particular attention. Seeing, hearing or even reading about a yawn can trigger one. The psychologist Dr Ama Owusu suggests that contagious yawning may be linked to social bonding, since some observations indicate that people are more likely to “catch” a yawn from someone they know well than from a stranger. Park is sceptical, arguing that familiarity may simply make people pay more attention to each other.

E Yawning also appears to be associated with changes in alertness. People often yawn when moving from one state to another – for example, when waking up or when becoming drowsy. Rossi suggests this fits his cooling idea, since a cooler brain may function more efficiently, whereas Owusu thinks it may simply reflect the body preparing to change activity.

F It is possible that yawning has more than one function, or that its original purpose differs from the role it plays today. As Owusu puts it, a behaviour can persist for reasons quite different from those that first made it useful.

The rise of citizen science

(Bài đọc tự viết; dự án, nhà nghiên cứu và số liệu là giả định.)

A Science has traditionally been carried out by professionals working in universities, laboratories and research institutes. In recent decades, however, a growing number of projects have invited members of the public to take part. Known as citizen science, this approach ranges from counting birds in a garden to classifying images of distant galaxies online.

B The most obvious advantage is scale. Many scientific questions require large amounts of data collected over wide areas or long periods – far more than any research team could gather alone. In the hypothetical Coastwatch project, for example, several thousand volunteers record the plastic waste they find on beaches each month, producing a picture of pollution along an entire coastline that would otherwise have been impossible to obtain.

C Citizen science may also benefit participants. Volunteers often report that taking part increases their understanding of scientific methods and their interest in environmental issues. Some researchers argue that this educational value is as important as the data itself, since it helps to build public trust in science. I find this argument persuasive, although it is harder to measure than the quantity of data collected.

D There are, however, legitimate concerns about data quality. Volunteers may lack training, make mistakes in identification or record information inconsistently. Critics argue that this limits the scientific value of citizen science. These concerns are real, but they can be reduced. Many projects now provide clear guidance, photo-based identification tools and checks that flag unusual records for expert review. In Coastwatch, a random sample of each volunteer’s records is checked by staff, and the error rate has fallen considerably since the project began.

E A further question concerns who takes part. Volunteers in many projects tend to be older, more educated and wealthier than the population as a whole, which may affect both the data – if certain areas are surveyed more than others – and the educational benefits. Some projects are trying to address this by working with schools and community groups in areas that are under-represented.

F It would be wrong to see citizen science as a replacement for professional research. Complex experiments, specialist equipment and careful analysis still require trained scientists. But as a complement, citizen science seems to me to have considerable value – not only for what it discovers, but for how it connects science with the society it serves.