Reading strategies_11th grade_13_14

1 You are going to read an article about 4 childhood experiences. Answer the questions by choosing from the people A – D. The people may be chosen more than once.
Memories
1 person
A When I was eleven years old, my dad inherited quite a large amount of money from a distant relative. It was typical of him that he decided to use the money to take a whole party of local kids to Disneyland in Florida for three days. Fortunately, I was able to go as well, which was tremendous. In those days, you had to buy tickets for each ride and so we made a checklist of them all and ticked them off one by one until we'd been on every one. They still had a donkey train and a canoe ride back then. My friend Eric bought a funny hat with his name on the front and then kept wondering how, all over Disneyland, random people knew his name and kept saying, 'Hi Eric!' My family will never let me forget how I ordered a bowl of potato chips on room service at the motel, which cost them a staggering $20. They were good chips, though!
2 person
B Most teenagers’ parents have normal jobs, you know like working in an office or being part of a company, but not my mum. She lives for her work and makes spur-of-the-moment decisions. When I was a teenager, it almost felt as if I was the parent and she was the child, as I tried to talk her out of whatever her latest scheme involved. You see, my mum's an archaeologist. She travels round the world finding exciting things in old ruins, and because she was always on the move, so was I! Sometimes I used to wonder if we'd ever settle down and lead a normal family life, but we never did, which is a shame really. Of course, now I'm going to make sure that I don't do the same to my daughter.
3 person
C I suppose being twins, my brother and I were always regarded as a single unit and we did do everything together. From an early age, we were into inventing things, especially things which exploded like rockets, although I don't ever recall any actually leaving the ground. We were keen on Maths at school and bought a computer when we were eleven years old. It was the best time for getting into computers because there was very little software about in those days, so if you wanted to make the computer do anything, you had to write it yourself. Before long we were selling the stuff we'd written to software companies. I don't think we knew how to turn our interest into money at that stage, having no commercial experience. But we soon found plenty of people who did know, but who couldn't handle the technical side. We haven't looked back since.
4 person
D When I was a teenager, my parents used to send my brother and me off on a week-long summer activity camp each year. Actually, we went to the same place five years running. I think it was because they wanted us to do something outdoors rather than have us sitting in front of a computer screen at home. And it was certainly challenging, if you consider we learnt to do things like climbing and caving. It wouldn't suit all kids, but for us it was great. We found out how to fend for ourselves and we met lots of people from around the world. I'm still in touch with some of them by e-mail even now. Looking back, I guess it cost my parents a lot of money, but as far as I'm concerned it was a good investment because it really broadened my horizons.
Which person mentions
1.being particularly close to a family member?
2.his/her intention to act differently from a parent?
3.enjoying the fact that something was difficult?
4.a way of making sure that he/she did not leave anything out?
5.an act of great generosity?
6.an opportunity to be creative?
7.getting in touch with people who could be of help?
8.regret at what may have been missed?
9.someone who found something puzzling?
10.someone else making a decision with his/her wellbeing in mind?
11.learning to be more independent?
12.purchasing something which changed his/her life?
13.someone who is unpredictable by nature?
14.something which is no longer available?
15.something that was in short supply?
Answers
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
















2 Read the text.
A If you show up a bit late for a meeting in Brazil, no one will be too worried. But if you keep someone in New York City waiting for ten or fifteen minutes, you may have some explaining to do. Time is seen as relatively flexible in some cultures but is viewed more rigidly in others. Indeed, the way members of a culture perceive and use time tells us about their society's priorities, and even their own personal view of the world.
B Back in the 1950s, anthropologist Edward T Hall described how the social rules of time are like a 'silent language' for a given culture. These rules might not always be made explicit, he stated, but 'they exist in the air'. He described how variations in the perception of time can lead to misunderstandings between people from separate cultures. 'An ambassador who has been kept waiting by a foreign visitor needs to understand that if his visitor "just mutters an apology", this is not necessarily an insult,' Hall wrote. 'You must know the social rules of the country to know at what point apologies are really due.'
C Social psychologist Robert V Levine says 'One of the beauties of studying time is that it's a wonderful window on culture. You get answers on what cultures value and believe in.' Levine and his colleagues have conducted so-called pace-of-life studies in 31 countries. In A Geography of Time, published in 1997, Levine describes how he ranked the countries by measuring three things: walking speed on urban sidewalks, how quickly postal clerks could fulfil a request for a common stamp, and the accuracy of public clocks. From the data he collected, he concluded that the five fastest-paced countries are Switzerland, Ireland, Germany, Japan and Italy; the five slowest are Syria, El Salvador, Brazil, Indonesia and Mexico.
D Kevin Birth, an anthropologist, has examined time perceptions in Trinidad. In that country, Birth observes, 'if you are meeting friends at 6.00 at night, people show up at 6.45 or 7.00 and say, "any time is Trinidad time".' When it comes to business, however, that loose approach works only for the people with power. A boss can show up late and just say 'any time is Trinidad time', but those under him are expected to be on time. Birth adds that the connection between power and waiting time is true for many other cultures as well.
E The complex nature of time makes it hard for anthropologists and social psychologists to investigate. 'You can't simply go into a society, walk up to someone and say, "Tell me about your concept of time",' Birth says. 'People don't really have an answer to that. You have to come up with other ways to find out.'
F Birth attempted to get at how Trinidadians regard time by exploring how closely their society links time and money. He surveyed rural residents and found that farmers - whose days are dictated by natural events, such as sunrise - did not recognise the phrases time is money, budget your time or time management even though they had satellite TV and were familiar with Western popular culture. But tailors in the same areas were aware of such notions. Birth concluded that wage work altered the tailors' views of time. The ideas of associating time with money are not found globally,' he says, 'but are attached to your job and the people you work with.'
G In addition to cultural variations in how people deal with time at a practical level, there may be differences in how they visualise it from a more theoretical perspective. The Western idea of time has been compared to that of an arrow in flight towards the future; a one-way view of the future which often includes the expectation that life should get better as time passes. Some cultures see time as closely connected with space: the Australian Aborigines' concept of the 'Dreamtime' combines a myth of how the world began with stories of sacred sites and orientation points that enable the nomadic Aborigines to find their way across the huge Australian landscape. For other cultures, time may be seen as a pattern incorporating the past, present and future, or a wheel in which past, present and future revolve endlessly. But theory and practice do not necessarily go together. 'There's often considerable variation between how a culture views the mythology of time and how they think about time in their daily lives,' Birth asserts.
Questions 1-7
The reading passage has seven paragraphs A-G.
Choose the correct heading for each paragraph from the list of headings below.
List of Headings
1.Time and technological development
2.A problem for those researching attitudes to time
3.Learning the laws of time for intercultural understanding
4.Time and individual psychology
5.Comparing the value of time for different groups of workers
6.Research and conclusions on the speed different nationalities live at
7.The history of time measurement
8.Attitudes to time and authority - a cross-cultural relationship
9.Variation in theoretical views of time
10.Attitude to time as an indication of cultural and individual differences
 A
B
C
D
E
F
G








Questions 8-12
Underline the correct letter, A, B, C or D
8 Edward Hall used the example of the ambassador to show that
A people in power are easily insulted.
B rules of time are different now from in the past.
C problems can be caused by different views of time.
D misunderstandings over time cannot be avoided.
9 In his research, Robert Levine measured the speed at which postal workers
A delivered letters. B performed a task. C learned a new skill. D answered a question.
10 Kevin Birth found out that in Trinidad
A	expectations of punctuality vary according to relationships.
B	time is regarded differently from anywhere else.
C	employees as well as bosses may be late for work.
D	people who are punctual eventually become more powerful.
11 Birth studied Trinidadian attitudes to time by 
     A asking questions connected with language. 
     B asking people how they felt about time.
     C observing how people behaved in different settings. 
     D collecting phrases to do with time.
12 Birth finds there is often a difference between
A	what cultures believe about time and what individuals believe.
B	people's practical and theoretical attitudes to time.
C	what people believe about time and what they say.
D	people's past and present attitudes to time.

Questions 13-15
Complete the summary below. Choose no more than two words from the passage for each answer.

Different cultures have different theories of time. In the West, time is sometimes said to be like an 13….. 'Dreamtime' for Australian Aborigines involves a special relationship between time and space. In other cultures, time may be compared to a 14….. or a 15…..