CAMBRIDGE READING PRACTICE TEST-1

READING PASSAGE 1
you should spent about 20 minutes on Questions 1-15 which are based on Reading Passage 1 below.
A spark, a flint:How fire leapt to life

The control of fire was the first and perhaps greatest of humanity’s steps towards a life-enhancing technology.To early man, fire was a divine gift randomly delivered in the form of lighting, forest fire or burning lava. Unable to make flame for themselves, the earliest peoples probably stored fire by keeping slow burning logs alight or by carrying charchol in pots.

How and where man learnt how to produce flame at will is unknown. It was probably a secondary invention ,accidentally made during tool-making operations with wood or stone. Studies of primtive societies suggest that the earliest method of making fire was through friction.European peasants would insert a wooden drill in a round hole and rotate it briskly between their palms. This process could be speeded up by wrapping a cord around the drill and pulling on each end.

READING PASSAGE 2

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 12-22 which and based on Reading Passage 2 on pages 6 and 7.

Questions 12-16

Reading Passage 2 has seven paragraphs A-G.

Choose the most suitable headings for paragraphs B-E and G from the list of heading below.

Write the appropriate numbers (i-x) in boxes 12-16 on your answer sheet.

NB There are more headings than paragraphs so you will not use all of them.

You may use any of the headings more than once.

READING PASSAGE 1

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-11 which are based on Reading Passage 1

A The eruption in May 1980 of Mount St. Helens, Washington State, astounded the world with its violence. A gigantic explosion tore much of the volcano’s summit to fragments; the energy released was equal to that of 500 of the nuclear bombs that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945.