Grade 12 Entrance Exam: English: Passage Questions: with Explanation and Exam Techniques: Part-2 (2002, 2004, 2006 and 2009EC): By Million Abebe (MA in TEFL/English and B. Ed. Degree in Pedagogy): 2023
Part-2: Passage Questions:
ADDITIONAL/NEW VERSION!
Grade 12 Entrance Exam: 2006/2014: English: Passage Questions
Passage
1. In which of the following counties has culture been reported to have the least effect on an individual's shyness?
B. Family relatives and single-parent
C. Genetics, environment and technology
D. Television, video games and Web pages
3. As used in Paragraph 2, which of the following words has nearly the same meaning as "quick sudden movement"?
C. stress D. Jerky
4. Which of the following does the author mention as evidence of the prevalence of shyness?
B. Shyness can result from both biological and environmental factors.
C. Research has found that some individuals are genetically predisposed to shyness.
D. Nearly half of the general population asked reported to have experienced some degree of shyness.
5. As used in the text, which of the following does the author mention as evidence of the genetic basis of shyness?
B. More parents of shy children admitted they were shy as adults than parents of non-shy children.
C. More parents of shy children admitted they were shy as children than parents of non-shy children
D. Environment had more impact on the parents of non-shy children than it had on parents of shy children.
6. As used in Paragraph 7, who does "our" in " ...coming about as a result of our huge advances in technology" refer to?
C. Readers of the passage
7. In Paragraph 3, the purpose of the author in using the statement "Many people who were not shy as children become shy as adults," is perhaps to show the:
B. impact of environment over human behavior.
C. relationship between genetics and environment.
D. role of genetics in determining human behavior.
8. As implied in Paragraph 4, which of the following is the benefit of frequent neighbor's or friends visits to children?
B. It helps children to grow up quickly.
C. It develops children's socializing skills.
D. It develops a good relationship between children and their parents.
9. According to the text, which one of the following best explains why children feel socially inhibited when they start school?
B. Growing up in small families.
C. Having inadequate social skill.
D. Growing up in single-parent home.
10. Which of the following statements is true according to the information in the passage?
B. In Israel, success is credited to parents.
C. In Japan, success is attributed to an individual.
D. A In Israel, failure is externally attributed to parents.
11. Which of the following is an example of human form of communication?
B. Talking to gas station attendants.
C. Playing video games after school.
D. Watching television in one's room.
12. As used in Paragraph 7, what does it in eventually, they increasingly become awkward at it. . .refer to?
B. Face-to-face interaction
C. Anonymous conversation
D. Non-human form of communication
13. Huge advances seen in technology has led to the growing dependence on non-human forms of communication. This, according to the author, has resulted in
B. an increase in the number of shy people.
C. making face-to-face communication necessary.
D. the difference between Japanese and Israelis cultures.
14. Which of the following sentences is true according to the passage?
B. Children who get frequent visits from friends or neighbours are less likely to feel socially inhibited.
C. Children who grow up in homes: in which both parents work full time have no relatives living nearby.
D. Children who grow up in homes in which both parents work full time have a difficult relationship with parents.
Grade 12 Entrance Exam: 2009/2017: English: Passage Questions
If the worst occurs, countless millions become environmental refugees, swamping the nations that tried to conserve their soil, water and forests. The great-grand-children of today’s young people would have to share the planet with only a ragged cohort of the adaptable species dominated by rates, cockroaches, weeds, microbes. The world in which they survived would consist largely of deserts, patches of tropical forests, eroded mountains, barren oceans, all buffeted by extremes of weather.
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Part-2: Passage Questions: Grade 12 Entrance Exams (English: Ethiopia) with Answers, Passage Exam Answering Techniques and Explanations in PDF and online forms
♦ If you want first to read passage exam answering techniques or if you haven't yet read it, click on the next links ---->Passage Questions Answering Techniques and Part-1: Passage Questions (Grade 12 Entrance Exam: English: 2013/2021)
DIRECTIONS: Read the following passages carefully and answer the questions that follow. Each question has four choices. Choose the best alternative and blacken the letter of your choice in the separate answer sheet provided.
If you suffer from shyness, you are not alone, for shyness is a universal phenomenon. According to recent research, "close to 50 percent of the general population report that they currently experience some degree of shyness in their lives. In addition, close to 80 percent of people report having felt shy, at some point in their lives". As shyness is so prevalent in the world, it is not surprising that social scientists are learning more about the cause. They have found that shyness in an individual can result from both biological and environmental factors.
Recent research reveals that some individuals are genetically predisposed to shyness. In other words, some people are born shy. Researchers say that between 15 and 20 percent of newborn babies show signs of shyness: they are quieter and more vigilant. Researchers have identified psychological differences between sociable and shy babies that show up as early as two months. In one study, two-month-olds who were later identified as shy children reacted with signs of stress to stimuli such as moving mobiles and tape recordings of human voices: increased heart rates, jerky movements of arms and legs, and excessive crying. Further evidence of the genetic basis of shyness is the fact that parents and grandparents of non-shy children more often say they were shy as children than parents and grandparents of shy children.
However, environment can, at least in some cases, triumph over biology. A shy child may lose much of his or her shyness. On the other hand, many people who were not shy as children become shy as adults, a fact that points to environmental or experiential causes.
The environmental cause of shyness may be a child's home and family life. Children who grew up with difficult relationship with parents or dominating older sibling are likely to be inhibited in social interactions. Another factor is the fact that today's children are growing up in smaller and fewer relatives living nearby. Growing up in single-parent homes or homes in which both parents work full time, children may not have the socializing experience of frequent visits by neighbours and friends. Because of their lack of social skills, they begin to feel socially inhibited, or shy, when they start school.
A second environmental cause of shyness in an individual may be one's culture. In a large study conducted in several nations, 40 percent of participants in the United States rated themselves as shy, compared to 57 percent in Japan and 55 percent in Taiwan. Of the countries participating in the study, the lowest percentage of shyness was found in Israel, where the rate was 31 percent.
Researchers Henderson and Zimbardo say, One explanation of the cultural difference between Japanese and Israelis lies in the way each culture deals with attributing credit for success and blame failure. In Japan, an individual's performance success is credited externally to parents, grandparents, teachers, and others, while failure is entirely blamed on the person. 'Therefore, Japanese learn not to take risks in public and rely instead on group-shared decisions. In Israel, the situation is entirely reversed," according to Henderson and Zimbardo. Failure is extremely attributed to parents, teachers, coaches, friends, and Anti Semitism, and other sources, while all performance success is credited to the individual's enterprise." The consequence is that Israelis are free to take risk since there is nothing to lose by trying.
In addition to family and culture, technology may play a role as well. In the United States, the number of young people who report being shy has risen from 40 percent to 50 percent in recent years. The rising numbers of shy young people may be, "due in part to the growing dependence on non - human forms of communication, coming about as a result of our huge advance in technology". Watching television, playing video games, and surfing the Web have displaced recreational activities that involve social interaction for many young people. Adults, too, are becoming more isolated as a result of technology. Face-to-face interactions with bank tellers, gas station attendants, and store clerks are no longer necessary because people can use machines to do their banking, fill their gas tanks, and order merchandise. College students take online telecourses. Telecommuters work at home, giving up daily contact with coworkers. Everyone texts, ' e-mails, and converses anonymously in online chat rooms. As a result, people have less opportunity to socialize in person. Eventually, they increasingly become awkward at it and start avoiding it altogether. In short, they become shy.
(Source: Writing Academic English, 2006)
A. Japan B. Taiwan C. Israel
D. United States of America
2. Which of the following best summarizes the main causes of shyness?
A. Culture, home and family
A. vigilant B. stimuli
A. Shyness is a universal phenomenon.
A. Parents of shy children are genetically predisposed to shyness.
A. Shy adults
B. The society at large
D. Author of the passage
A. genetic basis of shyness.
A. It helps children not to become shy.
A. Having few relatives.
A. Japanese learn to take risks in public.
A. Surfing the Web in an office.
A. Technology
A. watching television too much.
A. Because of lack of socializing experience, many children grow up in single-parent homes
Passage
The of the environment in the later part of the 21st century will be determined largely by one factor: human population. If the species doubles its number by 2050 to nearly 11 billion, humanity may complete devastation that has been accelerating over the last few decades. Such unabated expansion would continue to soak up the world’s capital and prevent the poorer nations from making the necessary investment that might deter continued population growth.
The best hope for humanity and other life-forms would be to cut human propagation in half, so that the world’s number would not exceed 8 million by mid-century. The only event in which the earth would achieve zero population growth or even shrinkage would be some environmental or social catastrophe. Donella Meadows, systems analyst, contends that the huge run-up in human number has foreclosed most options and shortened the amount of time available to come to grips with rising threats to the environment. In the past, Meadows argues, there were always new frontiers for exploding population as well as for empty lands to accept wastes. This is no longer true. Most suitable areas have been colonized. Many easy-to-find resources are already being exploited. Most dumping grounds have also filled up. Meadows believes that much work is waiting ahead to make the world look better than it does now.
For centuries humanity has confounded doomsayers by finding new supplies of food and energy. In the early 1970s some environmentalists interpreted temporary rises in food and oil prices to mean mankind was again pushing the earthly resources, yet surpluses returned in later years. This, according to Julian Simon, revealed a basic problem with limits-to-growth argument. Price rises caused by scarcities will always stimulate human ingenuity to improve efficiency and find new resources.
In the intervening years, however, there has been evidence that the market often fails to react as quickly as problems demand. In addition, market forces often work perversely to hasten the demise of species and resources. The increasing appetite for bluefin tuna among sushi lovers and health-conscious diners has vastly increased the market price of the fish. Instead of damping demand, the principal effect came to be extended fishing. This led to a marked decrease in the number of fish in the Atlantic.
Demographers refer to such collision between rising demand and diminishing resources as “train wrecks”. As the world adds new billions of people in even shorter periods, such potential conflicts happen almost everywhere. With most of the world’s good land already under the plow, a population of 11 billion human beings would probably have to make do with less than half the arable land per capita that exists today. That would set the stage for disaster, as farmers stripped nutrients from the soil, exacerbated erosion and gobbled up water and wild lands.
If population keeps building at the current rate, the most ominous effect is that millions of life-forms become extinct. Human, no matter how well behaved, cannot help crowding out natural systems. A survey of 50 countries by environmental researchers showed that habitat loss, the most important factor leading to extinction, rises in direct proportion to the density of the individuals that make up various species. Big animals often range over hundreds of square miles and increasingly collide with settlements. Smaller species, which make up most of nature’s diversity, are badly affected by human activities in countless ways.
The crucial question is whether humankind can afford to exterminate large numbers of other species without ruining the ecosystems that also sustain us. Whether or not humankind can afford to do this is unknown. However, reducing the burden placed on the earth by rising human numbers and the lifestyle of rich nations may a promising end.
To achieve this, the affluent consumption that recognize the limits of what the earth can provide and what wastes it can accommodate.
The poorer nations, on the other hand, require better education and improved family planning to stabilize their numbers. Adopting coercive measures to stabilize their family is also among the alternatives available to the poorer nations.
Adapted from: More Reading Power (1996): Addison-Wesley Publishing
1. Which of the following words is close in meaning to "soak up" as used in paragraph 1?
The best hope for humanity and other life-forms would be to cut human propagation in half, so that the world’s number would not exceed 8 million by mid-century. The only event in which the earth would achieve zero population growth or even shrinkage would be some environmental or social catastrophe. Donella Meadows, systems analyst, contends that the huge run-up in human number has foreclosed most options and shortened the amount of time available to come to grips with rising threats to the environment. In the past, Meadows argues, there were always new frontiers for exploding population as well as for empty lands to accept wastes. This is no longer true. Most suitable areas have been colonized. Many easy-to-find resources are already being exploited. Most dumping grounds have also filled up. Meadows believes that much work is waiting ahead to make the world look better than it does now.
For centuries humanity has confounded doomsayers by finding new supplies of food and energy. In the early 1970s some environmentalists interpreted temporary rises in food and oil prices to mean mankind was again pushing the earthly resources, yet surpluses returned in later years. This, according to Julian Simon, revealed a basic problem with limits-to-growth argument. Price rises caused by scarcities will always stimulate human ingenuity to improve efficiency and find new resources.
In the intervening years, however, there has been evidence that the market often fails to react as quickly as problems demand. In addition, market forces often work perversely to hasten the demise of species and resources. The increasing appetite for bluefin tuna among sushi lovers and health-conscious diners has vastly increased the market price of the fish. Instead of damping demand, the principal effect came to be extended fishing. This led to a marked decrease in the number of fish in the Atlantic.
Demographers refer to such collision between rising demand and diminishing resources as “train wrecks”. As the world adds new billions of people in even shorter periods, such potential conflicts happen almost everywhere. With most of the world’s good land already under the plow, a population of 11 billion human beings would probably have to make do with less than half the arable land per capita that exists today. That would set the stage for disaster, as farmers stripped nutrients from the soil, exacerbated erosion and gobbled up water and wild lands.
If population keeps building at the current rate, the most ominous effect is that millions of life-forms become extinct. Human, no matter how well behaved, cannot help crowding out natural systems. A survey of 50 countries by environmental researchers showed that habitat loss, the most important factor leading to extinction, rises in direct proportion to the density of the individuals that make up various species. Big animals often range over hundreds of square miles and increasingly collide with settlements. Smaller species, which make up most of nature’s diversity, are badly affected by human activities in countless ways.
The crucial question is whether humankind can afford to exterminate large numbers of other species without ruining the ecosystems that also sustain us. Whether or not humankind can afford to do this is unknown. However, reducing the burden placed on the earth by rising human numbers and the lifestyle of rich nations may a promising end.
To achieve this, the affluent consumption that recognize the limits of what the earth can provide and what wastes it can accommodate.
The poorer nations, on the other hand, require better education and improved family planning to stabilize their numbers. Adopting coercive measures to stabilize their family is also among the alternatives available to the poorer nations.
Adapted from: More Reading Power (1996): Addison-Wesley Publishing
1. Which of the following words is close in meaning to "soak up" as used in paragraph 1?
A. stop B. accelerate
C. absorb D. extend
2. Which of the following words is close in meaning to "doomsayers", as used in…… humanity has confounded doomsayers…. (paragraph 4)?C. absorb D. extend
A. people who predict disaster
B. environmentalists who lived in the 1970s
C. people who cause price rises that lead to scarcity
D. people who find new supplies of food and energy
3. From the words given below, which one shows the author’s dissatisfaction with human activity, as used in paragraph 1? B. environmentalists who lived in the 1970s
C. people who cause price rises that lead to scarcity
D. people who find new supplies of food and energy
A. expansion B. devastation
C. soak up D. prevent
4. What does "they" as used in …. The world in which they survived…. (paragraph 2) refer to? C. soak up D. prevent
A. millions who will become environmental refugees
B. today’s young people
C. our great-grand-children
D. our great-grand-children of today’s young people
5. What does "this" in the statement This is no longer true (paragraph 3) refer to? B. today’s young people
C. our great-grand-children
D. our great-grand-children of today’s young people
A. finding new frontiers and empty land
B. finding exploding population growth
C. achieving zero population growth
D. gripping threats with the environment
6. Which of the following statements is true according to the information in paragraph 3? B. finding exploding population growth
C. achieving zero population growth
D. gripping threats with the environment
A. Human population will not exceed 8 billion by 2050.
B. The time needed to respond to the rising environmental threats has now become short.
C. Making the world a better place for living requires more strenuous efforts now than ever before.
D. The world looks better if zero population growth through environmental catastrophe.
7. Which one of the following is NOT an example of rising threats to the environment? B. The time needed to respond to the rising environmental threats has now become short.
C. Making the world a better place for living requires more strenuous efforts now than ever before.
D. The world looks better if zero population growth through environmental catastrophe.
A. cutting human propagation in half
B. exterminating species and the ecosystem
C. stripping nutrients from the soil
D. creating mismatch between production and consumption
8. Which word from the given alternatives can be the best substitute for demise as used in …. hasten the "demise" of species and resource… (paragraph 5)?B. exterminating species and the ecosystem
C. stripping nutrients from the soil
D. creating mismatch between production and consumption
A. propagation B. population
C. damping D. death
9. Which of the following has the potential to turn millions onto environmental refugees? C. damping D. death
A. allowing unchecked growth of human population
B. conserving soil, water and forests
C. changing the pattern of production and consumption
D. enabling the poor nations to slow down population growth
10. Whose principal effect is implied in … the principal effect came to be… (paragraph 5)?B. conserving soil, water and forests
C. changing the pattern of production and consumption
D. enabling the poor nations to slow down population growth
A. the falling demand for fish
B. the increasing appetite for fish
C. the mismatch between demand and supply
D. the rise in the quantities of encouraged fishing
11. From the words given below, identify the one close in meaning to "collision", as used in paragraph 6. B. the increasing appetite for fish
C. the mismatch between demand and supply
D. the rise in the quantities of encouraged fishing
A. coercion B. influence
C. reaction D. conflict
12. From the following sentences, identify one potential consequence if population growth continues at the current rate. A. There will be a large number of new supplies of food and energy.
B. Humankind will be able to reduce the burden placed on the earth.
C. Humankind will exterminate the species and ruin the ecosystem.
D. There will be no collision between rising demand and diminishing resources.
B. Humankind will be able to reduce the burden placed on the earth.
C. Humankind will exterminate the species and ruin the ecosystem.
D. There will be no collision between rising demand and diminishing resources.
Grade 12 Entrance Exam: 2004/2012: English: Passage Questions (PDF, see the link at the END)
Grade 12 Entrance Exam: 2002/2010: English: Passage Questions (PDF, see the link at the END)
Grade 12 Entrance Exam: 2013/2021: English: Passage Questions (PDF, see the link at the END)
ANSWERS FOR THE ABOVE QUESTIONS 👇
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