WAEC SSCE WASSCE 2006 Comprehension passages
COMPREHENSION PASSAGE I
Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions on it.
Traditionally, libraries were large collections of books. Many people in institutions, offices and even individuals still keep and maintain such libraries. Today’s libraries form a vital part of the world’s system of communication and education. Unlike traditional theories, they have a wide variety of other materials that communicate, educate and entertain, made available through books, films, recordings, video tapes, photographs, computers, etc. This is a store of knowledge that has been gathered and kept through the ages.
People from all walks of life – students, lecturers, businessmen, lawyers, doctors, research workers –all use library resources in their work. Other people also turn to libraries to satisfy a desire for knowledge or to obtain a reading material to occupy their leisure periods. One, Professor Curtis said “Development is impossible unless formal education is accompanied by leisure-time reading.”
Libraries also play an important role in preserving a society's cultural heritage. Some libraries have special collections of such items as rare books or works of local artists, music, portraits of important people and stool regalia.
Many libraries, too, mount exhibitions and offer programs to help people learn more about their community and its culture. They inclusion of such materials in the library's collections reflects the efforts of libraries to keep pace with changing information systems and to serve people in as many ways as possible.
With the high cost of books, and the library becomes a place where students can consult reference books and borrow some of the required textbooks, if they cannot buy their own period to the teacher, libraries could help them prepare reading list to support their classroom and research work.
Students still consider libraries solely in terms of story books. If you ask them, ‘Why do you read Storybooks?’ they would invariably answer, ‘Oh just for pleasure’ or ‘to improve our proficiency in the use of English.’ move students, unfortunately, failed to appreciate that 3D star books and names them to invite useful bits of information unconsciously and effortlessly. This special benefit is invaluable.
Perhaps one of the most valuable benefits of reading stories or novels is the appreciation of a proper sense of acceptable values. One may learn to read that respect for time is essential to success is in business and in life in general. Such appreciation might help us bury the idea and attitude of the so called ‘African punctuality.’
Unlike most modern movies starting to play tricks on viewers motions and desires, good books are concerned with serious and important moral issues. They teach us, as they entertain readers: they prove that evil characters eventually do not end well and that the good almost always get the last laugh.
Questions
a) For each of the following words, find another word or phrase which means the same and which can replace it as it is used in the passage:
(i) satisfy
(ii) portraits
(iii) mount
(iv) consult
(v) proficiency
(vi) invaluable
b) What is the essential difference between traditional and modern libraries?
c) For what purposes do people normally resort to libraries?
d) What benefit does the reading of novels offer?
e) How are good novels different from most modern movies?
f) …from all walks of life.
i) What is the grammatical name of this expression?
ii) What is its function in the sentence?
COMPREHENSION PASSAGE II
Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions on it.
The class arranged itself loosely in a semi-circle around the demonstration platform. Their official age was around sixteen though, in fact, it ranged from Kojo’s fifteen years to one or two boys of twenty-one.
Mr. Abu, the laboratory attendant, came in from the adjoining store and briskly cleaned the blackboard. He was a retired sergeant, feared by boys. If he caught any of them in petty thieving, he offered them the choice of a hard smack on the backside or being reported to the science master. Most boys chose the former as they knew the matter would end there with no protracted interview, moral recrimination and entry in the conduct book.
The science master stepped in and stood on a small platform. A small, thin, dignified Negro, with greying hair and silver-rimmed spectacles. Vernier was his nickname as he insisted on exact measurement and Hello exact speech, ‘as fine as a vernier scale,’ he would say, which measured things in thousandths of a millimetre. Vernier set the experiments for the day and demonstrated them. It was a simple heat experiment to show that a dark surface gave out more heat by radiation than a bright surface.
During the class, Vernier what's called away to the telephone and Abu was about,to retire to the laboratory for a smoke. As soon as a posted sentinel announced that he was out of sight, pandemonium broke out. Some of the boys raided the store. The wealthier ones swiped rubber tube to make catapults into repair bicycles and help themselves to chemicals for developing films. The poorer boys were determined and took only things of strict commercial interest which could be sold easily in the market. The empty stuff from bottles in their pockets, soda for making soup, salt for cooking.
Kojo’s cowardly conscience goaded him to protest, which he mildly did, ‘Oh shut up!’ a few boys said. Sorie, a huge boy who commanded respect and some leadership in the class growled, ‘Look here, Kojo, you are getting out of hand. What do you think our parents pay taxes and school fees for? For us to enjoy or to buy a new car every year for Simpson?
The other boys laughed, Simpson was the European headmaster feared by the small boys, adored by the boys in the middle school, and liked by some of the seniors and African masters. He had a passion for new motor-cars, buying one yearly.
‘Come to think of it,’ Sorie continued, ‘Kojo, you must take something yourself, then we will know we are safe. ‘Yes, you must,’ the other boys insisted. Kojo gave in and, unwittingly, took a little nitrate for some gunpowder experiments which he was carrying out at home.
Questions
a) For each of the following words, find another word or phrase which means the same and which can replace it as it is used in the passage:
(i) ranged
(ii) protracted
(iii) dignified
(iv) sentinel
(v) pandemonium
b) Why did the boys fear Abu, the laboratory attendant?
c) How was the class left unattended?
d) How did the science master come by the nickname ‘Vernier’?
e) With details from the passage, show that the economic background of the boys was reflected in the manner they looted the science store?
f) What did Sorie do to confirm the writer’s statement that he commanded respect and had leadership skill?
g) Kojo’s cowardly conscience goaded him to protest.
What literary device is used in this expression?
h) “…we are safe.”
(i) What is the grammatical name for this expression?
(ii) What is its function?
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