Read the following passage and choose the letter A, B, C orD to indicate the correct answer for each of the blanks.

The ocean bottom - a region nearly 2.5 times greater than the total land area of Earth - is a vast frontier that even today is largely unexplored and uncharted. Until about a century ago, the deep-ocean floor was completely inaccessible, hidden beneath waters averaging over 3,600 meters deep. Totally without light and subjected to intense pressures hundreds of times greater than at the Earths surface, the deep-ocean bottom is a hostile environment to humans, in some ways as forbidding and remote as the void of outer space.

Although researchers have taken samples of deep-ocean rocks and sediments for over a century, the first detailed global investigation of the ocean bottom did not actually start until 1968, with the beginning of the National Science Foundations Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP). Using techniques first developed for the offshore oil and gas industry, the DSDP’s drill ship, the Glomar Challenger, was able to maintain a steady position on the ocean’s surface

and drill in very deep waters, extracting samples of sediments and rock from the ocean floor. The Glomar Challenger completed 96 voyages in a 15-year research program that ended in November 1983. During this time, the vessel logged 600,000 kilometers and took almost 20,000 core samples of seabed sediments and rocks at 624 drilling sites around the world. The Glomar challenger’s core samples have allowed geologists to reconstruct what the planet looked like hundreds of millions of years ago and to calculate what it will probably look like millions of years in the future. Today, largely on the strength of evidence gathered during the Glomar Challenger’s voyages, nearly all earth scientists agree on the theories of plate tectonics and continental drift that explain many of the geological processes that shape the Earth.

The cores of sediment drilled by the Glomar Challenger have also yielded information critical to understanding the world’s past climates. Deep-ocean sediments provide a climatic record stretching back hundreds of millions of years, because they are largely isolated from the mechanical erosion and the intense chemical and biological activity that rapidly destroy much land-based evidence of past climates. This record has already provided insights into the patterns and causes of past climatic change - information that may be used to predict future climates.

The author refers to the ocean bottom as a “frontier” because it_____________

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct word for each of the blanks.

Parents whose children show a special interest in a particular sport have a difficult decision to (33) _____________about their childrens career, should they allow their children to train to become top sportsmen and women? For many children it means starting very young and school work, going out with friends and other interests have to take second place. It’s very difficult to explain to a young child why he or she has to train for five hours a day, even at the weekend, when most of his or her friends are playing.

Another problem is of course money. In many countries money for training is (34) _____________from the government for the very best young sportsmen and women. If this help cannot be given, it means that it is the parents that have to find the time and the money to support their child’s (35) _____________and sports clothes, transport to competitions, special equipment etc. can all be very expensive.

Many parents are understandably concerned that it is dangerous to start serious training in a sport at an early age. Some doctors agree that young muscles may be damaged by training before they are properly developed. Professional trainers, (36) _____________, believe that it is only by starting young that you can reach the top as a successful sports person. What is clear is that very (37) _____________people reach the top and both parents and children should be prepared for failure even after many years of training.

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the following questions.

We need_____________money to send our son to Oxford University.

Tom denied_____________part in the fighting at school.

The government decided to pull down the old building after asking for the ideas from the local resident.

_____________really surprised all of us

Only after she had finished the course did she realize she_____________a wrong choice.

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the sentence that is closest in meaning to each of the following sentences.

"Do you believe in what the boy says, Mary?" said Tom.

We are_____________a survey to find out what our customers think of their local bus service.

John, along with twenty students, _____________a party

Mark the letter A, B, C or D on your answer sheet to indicate the sentence that is OPPOSITE in meaning to each of the following questions.

His physical condition was not an impediment to his career as a violinist. He has won a lot of prizes.

The students are expected to stick_____________their school’s regulation.