Practice test

Practice Test

In this section, you will listen to for lectures into conversations. You will hear each lecture and conversation one time.

After each listening passage, you will answer some questions about it. Most questions are worth one point, but some questions are worth more than one point. The directions indicate how many points you may receive.

You will have 30 to 40 minutes to both listen and answer the questions. The questions ask about the main idea and supporting details.

Some questions ask about a speaker’s purpose or attitude. You may take notes while you listen. You may use your notes to help you answer the questions. Your notes will not be scored.

In some questions, you will see this icon: this means you will hear part of the lecture or conversation again.

When you are ready, press continue.

01 biology

Listen to a lecture in a biology class

I want to talk about the hunting behavior of sharks, which due to some new study methods we’ve been able to learn a lot more about recently.

You know, with all the new data that’s been collected. Marine biologists are starting to see that what we thought we knew about hunting behavior in sharks was completely wrong.

See for a long time, scientists thought that sharks were solitary hunters like the leopard but as it turns out sharks might actually be group hunters like wolves.

Let’s look at some of the evidence.

Okay, so let me begin by explaining the methodology a little bit.

If only to take some time to appreciate what these Marine biologists did in the name of science.

So basically, a group of scientists took a little boat to Cocos Island and area in the Pacific Ocean. That’s about 300 miles off the coast of coast to Rica.

Let me just point out this is this is one of the most untouched and pristine Marine environments left on earth. It also happens to be the stomping grounds for many different kinds of sharks, making it a perfect place for scientists to learn about sharks.

Anyway, since the scientists were trying to learn about the hunting patterns of the sharks, they had to make the sharks hunt so they put out bait to bring the sharks to them.

It might sound insane, and they certainly did put themselves in extraordinary danger, but by doing this they were able to witness firsthand how sharks strike.

So, what exactly did they observe one thing they noticed was that after they had initially released the bait a single shark would first make its way toward the bow to begin feeding in a matter of mere moments though the boat would be completely surrounded by sharks?

What does this tell scientists well that the other sharks appeared after the first one struck led them to believe that sharks probably have some way of communicating with other sharks to alert them that food has been bound and in fact Marine biologist know that sharks have extremely sensitive hearing, but they haven’t completely figured out how it is that they send messages to each other.

Moving on okay well this was happening. Scientists also notice that the group was comprised of sharks of diverse age groups and genders so there were male sharks, female sharks, baby sharks, adult sharks and everything in between.

Marine biologist guessed that shark hunting groups are usually made up of sharks that are related to each other.

Furthermore, they observed that sometimes the older sharks would hold back some letting the younger sharks have first dibs on the praying this sort of suggests that the older sharks were allowing the younger ones to gain some experience and learn how to hunt.

Is that interesting or what any questions good as all the sharks were coming up to the boat.

The scientist place tracking devices on many of them. This, of course, let them observe their hunting patterns away from the boat which gives them a more I don’t know authentic view into the hunting behavior sharks and when they went back and looked at what the sharks were doing out there in open water, they were amazed.

Time and time again they witnessed the sharks displaying the same behavior as they did around the boat first one shark would strike, then the prey would be surrounded by an entire pack of sharks.

Interestingly their hunting patterns seem to involve a series of attacks that drove their prey into positions in which they couldn’t defend themselves in one instance, they found dozens of whale carcasses washed up on shore going over there tracking data.

They found that the area had recently been visited by the same pack of sharks that they had encountered earlier.

They concluded that they had taken advantage of the whales unfamiliarity with the region and struck in a series of surprise attacks the whales were easily intimidated and were cornered into an area where the sharks had their feeding frenzy.

1) What is the main topic of the lecture?

2) Listen again to part of the lecture. Then answer the question.

You know, with all the new data that’s been collected.

Marine biologists are starting to see that what we thought we knew about hunting behavior in sharks was completely wrong.

See for a long time, scientists thought that sharks were solitary hunters like the leopard but as it turns out sharks might actually be group hunters like wolves.

What does the professor mean when he says this: but as it turns out sharks might actually be group hunters like wolves?

3) What is the professor’s attitude toward the researchers worked around Cocos Island?

4) According to the passage, why do old sharks let young sharks hunt first?

5) How does the professor organize the information about tracking sharks that he presents to the class?

6) What can be inferred about whales?