ACA FLEX Reading 2-10

Martha and Mary were identical twin sisters in our high school class. They didn't dress identically, but they did share and exchange clothes, so it could be difficult to tell them apart without observing their behavior or conversing with them. As identical as they looked, they had quite different personalities. While both were soft-spoken, Martha would sometimes volunteer information or an experience relevant to the subject in class, while Mary never did. Martha was more social and outgoing. She both enjoyed and was serious about acting, and appeared in several school plays. Mary was more retiring, preferring reading, knitting, and listening to music. While they were very pretty, the twins did not date, but for different reasons. Martha had such high standards that no boy in high school was acceptable, and she preferred to wait for the greater variety of choices she would find in college. Mary, on the other hand, was too shy to talk to boys much in high school. College life helped her gain social confidence.

• ATo compare and contrast the personalities of twin sisters.
• BTo chronicle the developmental growth of identical twins.
• CTo describe vividly so readers feel they know both sisters.
• DTo support the argument that nature outweighs nurture.

Ancient Rome’s streets were named after the social status of their residents. But what do we know about the interactions between these varying classes? Conflicting ideas exist of how Rome’s inhabitants socialised. Some historical texts provide details of specific trading areas for differing classes, yet others suggest densely-populated streets where people of all statuses came to socialise. Archaeological findings, however, show that the gradual development of Rome’s commerce and infrastructure led to an increase in population and social activity among city-dwellers. These developments may have led to more social mixing, as we can see demonstrated by the kinds of seating area and mosaics excavated from the ancient city.

• AThe development of trade in Rome influenced the style of buildings around the city
• BHistorical texts provide certainty about the lifestyle of ancient Rome’s residents.
• CThe growth and development of the city directly affected the interactivity of its residents.
• DUncertainty about ancient Rome’s physical environment has been addressed by excavations.

The Romans glorified the ________ (3) shown in the arena, but ________ (4) the events and degraded the participants. Mosaic pictures of executions and combats, ________ (5) violent to our eyes, were displayed in the public rooms and even dining rooms in the homes of wealthy Romans. How can the viewer today possibly understand such images? Until fairly recently, modern authors writing about the arena minimized its significance and ________ (6) the institutionalized violence as a sideline to Roman history. The ________ (7) was also to view the events through our own eyes and to see them as pitiful or horrifying, although to most Romans empathy with victims of the arena was inconceivable. In the past few decades, however, scholars have started to analyze the complex motivations for deadly public entertainments and for contradictory views of gladiators as despised, yet beloved hero-slaves.

For a start, we need to change our ________ (8) of 'retirement', and we need to change mind-sets arising from earlier government policy which, in the face of high unemployment levels, encouraged mature workers to take early retirement. Today, government encourages them to ________ (9) their retirement. We now need to think of retirement as a phased process, where mature age workers ________ (10) reduce their hours, and where they have considerable flexibility in how they combine their work and non work time. We also need to recognise the broader change that is occurring in how people work, learn, and live. Increasingly we are moving away from a linear relationship between education, training, work, and retirement, as people move in and out of jobs, careers, caregiving, study, and leisure. Employers of choice remove the ________ (11) between the different segments of people's lives, by creating flexible conditions of work and a range of leave entitlements. They take an individualised approach to workforce planning and development so that the needs of employers and employees can be met ________ (12). This approach supports the different transitions that occur across the life course - for example, school to work, becoming a parent, becoming responsible for the care of older relatives, and moving from work to retirement.

The Elder Academy scheme, an education and social inclusion initiative, was ________ (13) in early 2007 by The Labour and Welfare Bureau and the Elderly Commission. The activities provide ________ (14) to learning opportunities in schools and university campuses and are aimed primarily at older people who have had little or no education. The scheme optimizes the use of existing ________ (15) facilities and has been successful in promoting both lifelong and initial learning for older people, encouraging participation and helping to maintain ________ (16) and mental wellbeing. School and university students are engaged in the scheme, thereby also promoting civic education and intergenerational understanding. Currently, some 125 elder academies in various districts and seven tertiary institutions offer a wide variety of courses.

Observe the dilemma of the fungus: it is a plant, but it possesses no chlorophyll. While all other plants put the sun’s energy to work for them combining the nutrients of ground and air into the body structure, the fungus must look elsewhere for energy supply. It finds it in those other plants which, having received their energy free from the sun, relinquish it at some point in their cycle either to animals (like us humans) or to the fungi. In this search for energy the fungus has become the earth’s major source of rot and decay. Wherever you see mould forming on a piece of bread, or a pile of leaves turning to compost, or a blown-down tree becoming pulp on the ground, you are watching a fungus eating. Without fungus action the earth would be piled high with the dead plant life of past centuries. In fact, certain plants which contain resins that are toxic to fungi will last indefinitely; specimens of the redwood, for instance, can still be found resting on the forest floor centuries after having been blown down.

• AFungus cleans up the planet for us.
• BFungus is a non-parasitic plant.
• CMould is a representation of fungus.tation of fungus.
• DFungus cannot eat some types of dead matter.
• EFungus cannot source energy at its own.

Dolphins are often regarded as one of Earth's most intelligent animals. They are social creatures, living in pods of up to a dozen individuals. In places with a high abundance of food, pods can merge temporarily, forming a superpod; such groupings may exceed 1,000 dolphins. They communicate using a variety of clicks, whistle-like sounds and other vocalizations. Membership in pods is not rigid; interchange is common. Dolphins can, however, establish strong social bonds; they will stay with injured or ill individuals, even helping them to breathe by bringing them to the surface if needed. This altruism does not appear to be limited to their own species. The dolphin Moko in New Zealand has been observed guiding a female Pygmy Sperm Whale together with her calf out of shallow water where they had stranded several times. They have also been seen protecting swimmers from sharks by swimming circles around the swimmers or charging the sharks to make them go away. Dolphins also display culture, something long believed to be unique to humans. In May 2005, a discovery in Australia found Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) teaching their young to use tools. They cover their snouts with sponges to protect them while foraging (looking or searching for food or provisions.) Using sponges as mouth protection as well as other transmitted behaviour proves dolphins' intelligence. This knowledge is mostly transferred by mothers to daughters.

• ADolphin Moko in New Zealand was observed guiding a female Pygmy Sperm Whale together with her calf out of deep water whey they had stranded several times.
• BThe animals can live in places with high abundance of food, where they form groups of more than 1000 dolphins.
• CThe membership of the pods is rigid and forms strong social bonds.
• DAll dolphins use sponges as mouth protection, a behaviour they inherit from mothers.
• EThey are the earth’s most intelligent animals.
• FThe strong social bond formed by dolphins is not witnessed when some of them are injured or ill.
• GDolphins protect swimmers from sharks by charging the sharks to make them go away.

The definition of any individual’s role in any situation will be a combination of the role expectations that the members of the role set have of the focal role. These expectations are often occupationally denned, sometimes even legally so. The role definitions of lawyers and doctors are fairly clearly defined both in legal and in cultural terms. The role definitions of, say, a film star or bank manager, are also fairly clearly defined in cultural terms, too clearly perhaps. Individuals often find it hard to escape from the role that cultural traditions have defined for them. Not only with doctors or lawyers is the required role behaviour so constrained that if you are in that role for long it eventually becomes part of you, part of your personality. Hence, there is some likelihood that all accountants will be alike or that all blondes are similar - they are forced that way by the expectations of their role. It is often important that you make it clear what your particular role is at a given time. The means of doing this are called, rather obviously, role signs. The simplest of role signs is a uniform. The number of stripes on your arm or pips on your shoulder is a very precise role definition which allows you to do certain very prescribed things in certain situations. Imagine yourself questioning a stranger on a dark street at midnight without wearing the role signs of a policeman! In organisations, office signs and furniture are often used as role signs. These and other perquisites of status are often frowned upon, but they may serve a purpose as a kind of uniform in a democratic society; roles without signs often lead to confused or differing expectations of the role of the focal person. Unfortunately, job descriptions are seldom complete role definitions, except at the lower end of the scale. At middle and higher management levels, they are often a list of formal jobs and duties that say little about the more subtle and informal expectations of the role. The result is therefore to give the individual an uncomfortable feeling that there are things left unsaid, i.e. to heighten the sense of role ambiguity.

• AIt would be a good idea to specify the role definitions of soldiers more clearly.
• BAccountants may be similar to one another because they have the same type of job.
• CIt is probably a good idea to keep dress as a role sign even nowadays.
• DThe decline in emphasis on marriage rituals should be reversed.
• EToday furniture operates as a role sign in the same way as dress has always done.
• FJob descriptions eliminate role ambiguity for managers

In Asia and much of the Third World, trees are still destroyed in an old-fashioned way: they are cut down for fuel and cropland. In Europe, there is a new and potentially more deadly culprit. The German call it ‘Waldsterben’, the dying forest syndrome. But the disease is far more than a German phenomenon. Since it was first observed by German scientists in the autumn of 1980, the mysterious malady has raced across Europe, blighting woods in countries as far apart as Sweden and Italy. Explanations for the epidemic range from a cyclic change in the environment to a baffling form of tree cancer. But the most convincing evidence points to air pollution. Indeed, saving the rapidly deteriorating forests of Europe will probably require a two-pronged strategy: an offensive campaign that includes the breeding of pollution-immune trees and a defensive scheme that calls for reductions in toxic emissions. But both will require more money than is currently being spent on such measures, as well as total commitment to protecting the environment.

• AAs the countries he is referring to are known as the third world, or under-developed countries.
• BSince science has made available modern and much-developed methods to satisfy these requirements.
• CAs the reasons for which the trees are cut are no longer valid in today’s scenario.
• DIt is a biased comment on the part of the narrator as it seems he belongs to a highly developed nation or society.
• EAs there are modern solutions for the requirement of fuel and cropland available to us now.