TOEFL READING PRACTICE 3

READING AND CONVERSATION CLASS

Reading Exercise 1.

Jazz has been called the art of expression set to music, and Americas great
contribution to music. It has functioned as popular art and enjoyed periods of fairly
widespread public response, in the jazz age of the 1920s, in the swing era of the late
Line 1930s and in the peak popularity of modern jazz in the late 1950s. The standard legend
(5) about Jazz is that it originated around the end of the 19th century in New Orleans and
moved up the Mississippi River to Memphis, St. Louis, and finally to Chicago. It welded
together the elements of Ragtime, marching band music, and the Blues. However, the
influences of what led to those early sounds goes back to tribal African drum beats and
European musical structures. Buddy Bolden, a New Orleans barber and cornet player, is
(10) generally considered to have been the first real Jazz musician, around 1891.

What made Jazz significantly different from the other earlier forms of music was
the use of improvisation. Jazz displayed a break from traditional music where a composer
wrote an entire piece of music on paper, leaving the musicians to break their backs
playing exactly what was written on the score. In a Jazz piece, however, the song is
(15) simply a starting point, or sort of skeletal guide for the Jazz musicians to improvise
around. Actually, many of the early Jazz musicians were bad sight readers and some
couldnt even read music at all. Generally speaking, these early musicians couldnt make
very much money and were stuck working menial jobs to make a living. The second wave
of New Orleans Jazz musicians included such memorable players as Joe Oliver, Kid Ory,
(20) and Jelly Roll Morton. These men formed small bands and took the music of earlier
musicians, improved its complexity, and gained greater success. This music is known as
hot Jazz due to the enormously fast speeds and rhythmic drive.

A young cornet player by the name of Louis Armstrong was discovered by Joe
Oliver in New Orleans. He soon grew up to become one of the greatest and most
(25) successful musicians of all time, and later one of the biggest stars in the world. The impact
of Armstrong and other talented early Jazz musicians changed the way we look at music.

1. The Passage answers which of the following questions?

(A) Why did Ragtime, marching band music, and the Blues lose popularity after about 1900?
(B) What were the origins of Jazz and how did it differ from other forms of music?
(C) What has been the greatest contribution of cornet players to music in the twentieth century?
(D) Which early Jazz musicians most influenced the development of Blues music?

2. According to the passage, Jazz originated in

(A) Chicago (B) St. Louis
(C) along the Mississippi river (D) New Orleans

3. The word welded in line 6 is closest in meaning to

(A) squeezed (B) bound (C) added (D) stirred

4. According to the passage, which of the following belonged to the second wave of New Orleans Jazz
musicians?
(A) Louis Armstrong (B) Buddy Bolden (C) St. Louis (D) Joe Oliver
5. All of the following are true EXCEPT
(A) the late 1930s was called the swing era
(B) hot Jazz is rhythmic
(C) Jazz has been said to be Americas greatest contribution to music
(D) Joe Oliver is generally considered to be the first real Jazz musician
Reading Exercise 2.
The Moon has been worshipped by primitive peoples and has inspired humans to
create everything from lunar calendars to love sonnets, but what do we really know about
it? The most accepted theory about the origin of the Moon is that it was formed of the
Line debris from a massive collision with the young Earth about 4.6 billion years ago. A huge
(5) body, perhaps the size of Mars, struck the Earth, throwing out an immense amount of
debris that coalesced and cooled in orbit around the Earth.

The development of Earth is inextricably linked to the moon; the Moons

gravitational influence upon the Earth is the primary cause of ocean tides. In fact, the
Moon has more than twice the effect upon the tides than does the Sun. The Moon makes
(10) one rotation and completes a revolution around the Earth every 27 days, 7 hours, and 43
minutes. This synchronous rotation is caused by an uneven distribution of mass in the
Moon (essentially, it is heavier on one side than the other) and has allowed the Earths
gravity to keep one side of the Moon permanently facing Earth. It is an average distance
from Earth of 384,403 km.

(15) The Moon has no atmosphere; without an atmosphere, the Moon has nothing to
protect it from meteorite impacts, and thus the surface of the Moon is covered with impact
craters, both large and small. The Moon also has no active tectonic or volcanic activity, so
the erosive effects of atmospheric weathering, tectonic shifts, and volcanic upheavals that
tend to erase and reform the Earths surface features are not at work on the Moon. In fact,
(20) even tiny surface features such as the footprint left by an astronaut in the lunar soil are
likely to last for millions of years, unless obliterated by a chance meteorite strike. The
surface gravity of the Moon is about one-sixth that of the Earths. Therefore, a man
weighing 82 kilograms on Earth would only weigh 14 kilograms on the Moon.
The geographical features of the Earth most like that of the Moon are, in fact, places such
(25) as the Hawaiian volcanic craters and the huge meteor crater in Arizona. The climate of the
Moon is very unlike either Hawaii or Arizona, however; in fact the temperature on the
Moon ranges between 123 degrees C. to 233 degrees C.

1. What is the passage primarily about?

(A) the Moons effect upon the Earth
(B) the origin of the Moon
(C) what we know about the Moon and its differences to Earth
(D) a comparison of the Moon and the Earth

2. According to the passage, the Moon is

(A) older than the Earth (B) protected by a dense atmosphere
(C) composed of a few active volcanoes (D) the primary cause of Earths ocean tides

3. The word uneven in line 11 is closest in meaning to

(A) Heavier (B) Equally distributed
(C) Orderly (D) Not uniform

4. A person on the Moon would weigh less than on the Earth because
(A) of the composition of lunar soil
(B) the surface gravity of the Moon is less
(C) the Moon has no atmosphere
(D) the Moon has no active tectonic or volcanic activity
5. All of the following are true about the Moon EXCEPT
(A) it has a wide range of temperatures
(B) it is heavier on one side than the other
(C) it is unable to protect itself from meteorite attacks
(D) it has less effect upon the tides than the Sun
Reading Exercise 3.
People of Hispanic origin were on the North American continent centuries before
settlers arrived from Europe in the early 1600s and the thirteen colonies joined together to
form the United States in the late 1700s. The first census of the new nation was conducted
Line in 1790, and counted about four million people, most of whom were white. Of the white
(5) citizens, more than 80% traced their ancestry back to England. There were close to
700,000 slaves and about 60,000 free Negroes. Only a few Native American Indians who
paid taxes were included in the census count, but the total Native American population
was probably about one million.

By 1815, the population of the United States was 8.4 million. Over the next 100
(10) years, the country took in about 35 million immigrants, with the greatest numbers coming
in the late 1800s and early 1900s. In 1882, 40,000 Chinese arrived, and between 1900
and 1907, there were more than 30,000 Japanese immigrants. But by far, the largest
numbers of the new immigrants were from central, eastern, and southern Europe.

An enormous amount of racial and ethnic assimilation has taken place in the United
(15) States. In 1908, play-write Israel Zangwill first used the term melting pot to describe the
concept of a place where many races melted in a crucible and re-formed to populate a
new land. Some years during the first two decades of the 20th century, there were as
many as one million new immigrants per year, an astonishing 1 percent of the total
population of the United States.

(20) In 1921, however, the country began to limit immigration, and the Immigration Act of
1924 virtually closed the door. The total number of immigrants admitted per year dropped
from as many as a million to only 150,000. A quota system was established that specified
the number of immigrants that could come from each country. It heavily favored
immigrants from northern and western Europe and severely limited everyone else. This
(25) system remained in effect until 1965, although after World War II, several exceptions were
made to the quota system to allow in groups of refugees.

1. Why did the author write the passage?

(A) to outline the ways immigration has been restricted
(B) to emphasize the impact of migrants from Europe
(C) to explain and give examples of the concept of a melting pot
(D) to summarize the main features of immigration

2. The word their in line 5 refers to which of the following

(A) immigrants (B) people of Hispanic origin
(C) white citizens (D) Native Americans

3. Which of the following is true, according to the passage?

(A) a quota system was in place from 1908
(B) a peak period of immigration was in the late 1800s and early 1900s
(C) slaves were not counted in the first census
(D) only those who paid taxes were included in the first census

4. The number of immigrants taken in over the 100 years to 1915 was
(A) probably about 1 million (B) about 35 million
(C) 8.4 million (D) about 4 million
5. Which of the following is NOT true about immigrants
(A) they were subjected to an official quota in the Immigration Act from 1924
(B) during the 1900s immigrants numbered 1 percent of the total population
(C) settlers of Hispanic origin arrived centuries before those from Europe
(D) numbers began to be limited from 1921
Reading Exercise 4.
Considered the most influential architect of his time, Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-
1959) was born in the small rural community of Richland Center, Wisconsin. He entered
the University of Wisconsin at the age of 15 as a special student, studying engineering
Line because the school had no course in architecture. At the age of 20 he then went to work
(5) as a draughtsman in Chicago in order to learn the traditional, classical language of
architecture. After marrying into a wealthy business family at the age of 21, Wright set up
house in an exclusive neighborhood in Chicago, and after a few years of working for a
number of architectural firms, set up his own architectural office.

For twenty years he brought up a family of six children upstairs, and ran a thriving
(10) architectural practice of twelve or so draughtsmen downstairs. Here, in an idyllic American
suburb, with giant oaks, sprawling lawns, and no fences, Wright built some sixty rambling
homes by the year 1900. He became the leader of a style known as the Prairie school -
houses with low-pitched roofs and extended lines that blended into the landscape and
typified his style of organic architecture.

(15) By the age of forty-one, in 1908, Wright had achieved extraordinary social and
professional success. He gave countless lectures at major universities, and started his
Taliesin Fellowship a visionary social workshop in itself. In 1938 he appeared on the
cover of Time magazine, and later, on a two cent stamp. The most spectacular buildings
of his mature period were based on forms borrowed from nature, and the intentions were
(20) clearly romantic, poetic, and intensely personal. Examples of these buildings are Tokyos
Imperial Hotel (1915-22: demolished 1968), and New York Citys Guggenheim Museum
(completed 1959) He continued working until his death in 1959, at the age of 92, although
in his later years, he spent as much time giving interviews and being a celebrity, as he did
in designing buildings. Wright can be considered an essentially idiosyncratic architect
whose influence was immense but whose pupils were few.

1. With which of the following subjects is the passage mainly concerned?

(A) the development of modern architecture in America
(B) the contributions of the Prairie School to modern architecture
(C) the life and achievements of a famous architect
(D) the influence of the style of organic architecture in America

2. Frank Lloyd Wright first worked as a draughtsman because

(A) for twenty years he lived above his shop and employed draughtsmen
(B) to learn the language of architecture
(C) that is what he studied at the University of Wisconsin
(D) that is the work of new employees in architectural firms

3. According to the passage, an idyllic American suburb is

(A) based on forms borrowed from nature
(B) blended into the landscape
(C) giant oaks, sprawling lawns, and no fences
(D) houses with low-pitched reefs and extended lines

4. The word blended in line 13 is closest in meaning to

(A) dug (B) cut (C) imposed (D) merged
5. All of the following about Frank Lloyd Wright are true EXCEPT
(A) he became the leader of a style known as organic architecture
(B) he died at the age of 92
(C) he commenced university studies at the age of 15
(D) some of his most spectacular buildings were not in America
Reading Exercise 5.
The healing power of maggots is not new. Human beings have discovered it several
times. The Maya are said to have used maggots for therapeutic purposes a thousand
years ago. As early as the sixteenth century, European doctors noticed that soldiers with
Line maggot-infested wounds healed well. More recently, doctors have realized that maggots
(5) can be cheaper and more effective than drugs in some respects, and these squirming
larvae have, at times, enjoyed a quiet medical renaissance. The problem may have more
to do with the weak stomachs of those using them than with good science. The modern
heyday of maggot therapy began during World War I, when an American doctor named
William Baer was shocked to notice that two soldiers who had lain on a battlefield for a
(10) week while their abdominal wounds became infested with thousands of maggots, had
recovered better than wounded men treated in the military hospital. After the war, Baer
proved to the medical establishment that maggots could cure some of the toughest
infections.

In the 1930s hundreds of hospitals used maggot therapy. Maggot therapy requires the
(15) right kind of larvae. Only the maggots of blowflies (a family that includes common
bluebottles and greenbottles) will do the job; they devour dead tissue, whether in an open
wound or in a corpse. Some other maggots, on the other hand, such as those of the
screw-worm eat live tissue. They must be avoided. When blowfly eggs hatch in a patients
wound, the maggots eat the dead flesh where gangrene-causing bacteria thrive. They also
(20) excrete compounds that are lethal to bacteria they dont happen to swallow. Meanwhile,
they ignore live flesh, and in fact, give it a gentle growth-stimulating massage simply by
crawling over it. When they metamorphose into flies, they leave without a trace although
in the process, they might upset the hospital staff as they squirm around in a live patient.
When sulfa drugs, the first antibiotics, emerged around the time of World War II, maggot
(25) therapy quickly faded into obscurity.

1. Why did the author write the passage?

(A) because of the resistance to using the benefits of maggots
(B) to demonstrate the important contribution of William Baer
(C) to outline the healing power of maggots
(D) to explain treatment used before the first antibiotics

2. The word renaissance in line 6 is closest in meaning to

(A) revival (B) resistance
(C) support (D)condemnation

3. According to the passage, William Bayer was shocked because

(A) two soldiers had lain on the battlefield for a week
(B) the medical establishment refused to accept his findings
(C) the soldiers abdominal wounds had become infested with maggots
(D) the soldiers had recovered better than those in a military hospital
4. Which of the following is true, according to the passage?
(A) sulfa drugs have been developed from maggots
(B) maggots only eat dead tissue
(C) bluebottles and greenbottles produce maggots
(D) blowfly maggots only eat dead tissue

5. All of the following are true EXCEPT

(A) maggots come from eggs
(B) maggots eat bacteria
(C) maggots are larvae
(D) William Bayer discovered a new type of maggot