LOS CURSOS DE INGLES
GRATIS PREFERIDOS POR LOS HISPANOHABLANTES
TIME
ALLOWED: 2 hours 30 minutes - TIEMPO PERMITIDO: 2 horas 30 minutos
SECTION
A Reading Comprehension
1a.
Read the
passage CAREFULLY and decide if the statements below are T (true) or F (false).
1.
George
Pitcher has always been a very happy person.
2.
Ed
was very pleased to learn that George was going to keep the dogs at
home.
3.
The
dogs helped George to express affection.
4.
Mrs.
Pitcher's therapist admitted that Lupa and Remus had been more
successful at helping George than he had.
5.
Both
George and Ed missed the dogs when they died.
6.
'The
Dogs Who Came To Stay' is a book recommended only for people who
care for dogs.
1b.
Read the
passage CAREFULLY and find the words in the text that mean:
PARAGRAPH
2
a.
psychoanalyst
or psychiatrist.
PARAGRAPH
4
b.
a secret place
where one can go in order not to be seen or found.
PARAGRAPH
6
c.
feeling very
tired and weak, exhausted.
PARAGRAPH
7
d.
fondness,
affection, friendship.
PARAGRAPH
9
e.
to express
sorrow, to feel great sadness.
PARAGRAPH
10
f.
advantages,
good qualities.
THE
HEALING POWER OF DOGS
1.
George
Pitcher is a middle-aged Professor of Philosophy at Princeton
University, New Jersey. He shares a house with another bachelor
academic, Ed.
2.
For
the past nine years George has journeyed three times a week to New
York City to consult a shrink. His problem, all his life, has been a
"crippling inability" to feel or express affection. He
buries his emotions, and is a chronic pessimist.
3.
One
day George discovers that a stray dog has secretly dug a hole under
their garden shed, creating a nest where it could give birth to its
seven puppies. Ed, the practical one, says: "Send them to the
dog's home".
4.
But
George becomes fascinated by the distrustful creature that slips by
nightfall into its hideout after raiding the local garbage dumps. He
puts out food. Each morning the bowl is licked clean, but the dog
refuses to appear. George respects her fearfulness, and - always the
philosopher - speculates on "What had she endured? How must she
have been mistreated?", that she simply could not allow herself
to be approached by any human being. For days he mounts a campaign of
gentle seduction.
5.
Then
one afternoon he finds the bitch, not cowering back in the darkness of
the hole, but crouching just a foot from where he knelt. Very slowly
she began to wag her tail. "With that gentle motion", the
author confesses, "all my defenses were instantly swept
away". "Well then," I said to myself as she suddenly
looked blurred to me, "I'm yours forever!".
6.
When
George tells his partner he wants to adopt the bitch, Ed is horrified.
"Why", he says, "with your compulsiveness about work,
and all those trips to your shrink, you're already worn-out: You even
feel guilty if we go to a movie on Saturday night!". But
eventually Ed, too, is won over.
Well, you've guessed it: the dog stays, together with one of her
puppies, and George gives up the shrink. Lupa and Remus, as they
christen them for their wolf-like appearance, become the new focus of
the two mid-aged bachelors' lives. They take them on the QE2 when they
go on holiday to Provence (unlike Britain, America has no hang-ups
about quarantine).
7.
On
the return journey the QE2 is swept by fire, bringing horrendous fears
for the dogs imprisoned in their kennels, and confirming the depth of
the professors' attachment.
8.
By
her own demanding - and giving - of affection Lupa, George admits,
cured him of all his self-doubts. His honest therapist tells him that
the dogs had achieved more than he had.
9.
Eventually,
and inevitably, after 14 years and at a ripe old (estimated) age of
17, Lupa dies - followed, a three years later, by Remus. It left
"a great empty place in their waking lives", says George;
but it also taught him, at last, how "to face death with
dignity" and how to grieve.
10.
I
recommend 'The Dogs Who Came To Stay' strongly, as an ideal
stocking-filler not just for dog-lovers, but for those, too, who
think not carefully enough about giving a pet for Christmas and
especially for British politicians pondering the merits of humanizing
our cruel quarantine laws.
SECTION
B Language in Use
1.
Choose
the correct alternative. e.g. I'm really looking forward
/ for / up to your party.
1.
They
hoped that the strike would be called .
2.
Have
you put your tent yet?
3.
It
was a clever joke but it didn't quite come .
4.
If
you come a difficult exercise, leave
it and move on to another.
5.
Watch
!!! There's a car coming.
2.
Rewrite
the following sentences using the beginning or ending provided.
1.
The
builder will finish replastering the walls before Monday.
by Monday.
2.
Nobody
will know the result of the election until late tonight.
The
result .
3.
I
won't do the job if I don't get paid.
Unless
.
4.
Why
don't we go to the cinema tonight?
Tom
suggested .
5.
I
hurt my head when I crashed the car because I wasn't wearing my seat
belt.
If
.
6.
It
was silly of me not to listen to my mother's advice.
I
should .
7.
She
was very proud, but she apologized.
Despite .
3.
Put
the verbs in brackets into the correct form. USE MODALS WHERE
NECESSARY.
I
(really / not know) my father He isn't easy to get on with. He's quite self-centered, and a
little bit vain, I think, and in some ways quite unapproachable.
He can't (be) at
home much when I (be) a child, because I don't remember much about him. He (always / be)
slightly out of touch
with family life. His work always came first, and he (always rehearse)
somewhere. He loves (ask) for his autograph. He (win)
several awards, and he's
very proud of that. He (give) a medal by the Queen, and we had to go to Buckingham Palace to get it.
It was incredibly boring - there were hundreds of other people (get)
the same thing, and you
had to stay there for hours. He (show off) his award to whoever comes to the house.
SECTION
C Writing
Write
between 150 and 180 words on ONE of the following.
1.
Write
an account of your best / worst experience with your neighbors.
2.
You
have just read an article about people with special spiritual powers.
Write a letter to the editor of the magazine describing a psychic
experience you once had.
HOW
TO SELF-EVALUATE THIS EXAM: Section A - Exercise 1a: Score 1 (one) point for each correct answer.
Section A - Exercise 1b: Score 1.5 (one and a half) points for each correct answer.
Section B - Exercise 1: Score 3 (three) points for each correct
answer.
Section B - Exercise 2: Score 5.5 (five and a half) points for each correct answer.
Section B - Exercise 3: Score 3 (three) points for each correct
answer.
FINAL SCORE FOR SECTIONS "A" AND "B" Check your final score with this list: 90-100 points: A or Excellent;
80-89 points: B or Very Good; 70-79 points: C or Fair; 69 or below:
Need to review grammar.
