Page 65 - Exercise 1

Page 65 - Exercise 1

The USA

THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA is the fourth largest country in the world. It’s bigger than the whole of Europe, but it isn’t the largest country in North America. That’s Canada. There are five time zones in the USA. So, when it’s twelve o’clock in New York, it’s only seven o’clock in Hawaii.

The third longest river in the world is in the USA. It’s the Mississippi-Missouri River.

The USA is the richest country in the world. It produces more food, iron, cars, aeroplanes, books, music and TV programmes than any other country.

The USA has a population of about 300 million people.

Most of them live in cities.

The largest city in the USA is New York. About eight million people live there. The second largest city is Los Angeles in California and the third largest is Chicago.

There are fifty states in the United States. Some of the eastern states, like Rhode Island and Delaware, are quite small. Rhode Island is, in fact, the smallest state. Others, like Texas, California and Alaska, are bigger than a lot of countries.

Alaska is the largest state. It’s also got the highest mountain in North America - Mount McKinley.

Each state has got its own government and its own capital city. The federal capital for the whole of the USA is Washington DC. The US President lives there, in the White House. The flag of the USA is called the ‘Stars and Stripes’. On the flag there is one star for each of the fifty states. The thirteen stripes are for the original thirteen states. These states formed the USA in 1776.

The first settlers in the USA came from Britain, but now the USA has people from all over the world - from Europe, Asia, Africa and South America.