PART 1 QUESTIONS 1

This is the Listening Section. Please play the audio by clicking the Play button.

Part 1:

You will hear a woman showing two people around the pool and gym.

Before you listen, you have 30 seconds to read questions 1 to 4.

Louise Good evening. I’m Louise, I’ll be showing you the complex.

Wei Wei Nice to meet you, Louise. I’m Wei Wei.

Terry And I’m Terry.

Louise The tour takes 20 to 30 minutes. Do you have time?

Wei Wei & Sure.

Terry No problem.

Louise (1) We always like to ask people who come here for the first time how they found out about us.

Wei Wei We work on Albert Street, not far away.

Louise So, you saw our new sign?

Terry I must say I love the blue dolphin, but, in fact, I didn’t notice it until this evening.

Louise Did you read about us online? We’ve had some great reviews.

Wei Wei & No, I didn’t.

Terry I’m afraid not.

Louise So?

Wei Wei (1) A woman at work comes here, and she loves it.

She swims every lunchtime. I’m hoping to join her.

Louise In winter, midday classes are popular. Or were you thinking of swimming by yourself?

Wei Wei I’m not sure. Taking a class could be more motivating than doing laps on my own.

Louise True.

(2) The number one reason people stop going to a pool or a gym is not the cost, not even the time, but a lack of enthusiasm. They just run out of steam.

Terry Speaking of steam, you’ve got a sauna here, haven’t you?

Louise Yes, we have. It’s a great place to relax.

(3) But, let’s have a look at the main pool, first.

Recently renovated, this eight-lane 25-metre pool is heated to 27℃elsius.

Wei Wei Sounds nice.

Louise The Children’s Pool, next door, is even warmer at 31.

Terry Charlie might like that, Wei Wei.

Louise (4) Does your son, Charlie, swim, Terry?

Terry Actually, Charlie’s not my son.

Louise Oh, I’m terribly sorry.

Terry I’m common mistake. [Crack IELTS with Rob] We’re from the same country, and we work for the same company, but we’re not a couple.

Narrator Before you listen to the rest of the conversation, you have 30 seconds to read questions 5 to 10.

Louise Well, I’ve shown you everything.

Terry It certainly is impressive. I think I could easily hang out and work out here.

Louise So, let’s talk about membership.

Wei Wei I think I’ll start with a Weekly Membership. I’m all too conscious of my limitations, and you’re right about people giving up. I’ve done that before!

I’d like to sign up for the Water Polo class, between (5) twelve and one, and for the Stroke (6) Correction class.

Louise I teach Stroke (6) Correction on (7) Saturdays. You may find it’s a struggle at first, but within a few lessons, your speed will really increase. Most swimmers have no idea that the way they use their arms affects their performance.

Wei Wei Do you also work on swimmers’ legs? Mine are very weak.

Louise That’s for another class, called Kick Correction.

What about classes for Charlie?

Wei Wei Charlie’s in a wheelchair at the moment. He’s just had an operation. I see you’ve got (8) wheelchair access through the parking lot and (8) a ramp into the Children’s Pool. He’ll need both of those. Maybe once Charlie’s comfortable in the water, we’ll think about classes.

Louise I do hope so.

What about you, Terry?

Terry I think I’ll go for an (9) Annual Membership. [Crack IELTS with Rob] I’m moving into an apartment just two blocks away this weekend. First up, I’d like to take the Monday-night Weight Training class in the gym. And, I noticed your offer of a (10) personal trainer for a one-month trial. Once my (10) personal trainer has developed a program for me, I’m sure I’ll take some more classes.

Narrator You now have 30 seconds to check your answers.

That is the end of Part 1.

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Part 2:

You will hear a man talking about plans to redevelop a wharf.

Before you listen, you have 30 seconds to read questions 11 to 16.

Speaker Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks for coming to this forum about the redevelopment of Queen’s Wharf. I hope you’ve got some tea or coffee, and you’ve put your phones on silent.

Right. Essentially, we’re now dealing with the final phase of the project. [Crack IELTS with Rob] If you’ve looked at the plans, you’ve noticed that a couple of changes have been made to the developer went bankrupt; when Cato and Brown took the project over, they scaled things down. As a result, there are no apartments on the second floor of the wharf- in fact, (11) there won’t be a second floor at all. I’m sure a fair few of you will applaud this decision since you thought you’d lose your harbor views.

(12) What else has been scrapped? Oh yes, the fourth jetty for water taxis. It seems the contract with Fletcher’s Taxis has been amended so vessels can dock at any of the three jetties as long as no ferry is within five minutes of arrival.

(13) Depending on your feedback, there are some other features of the plan that Cato and Brown may yet dispense with. For instance, the canopy extension was highly controversial in the first consultation, and, since the canopy doesn’t go on until the very end, (13) its size is yet to be determined. It has to cover the existing structure, but whether it goes out over the (14) bus shelter is another matter. As many members of the public pointed out, there was no shelter at all; people used to wait inside the wharf building. However, the owners of the commercial space complained: bus passengers rarely bought anything more than a newspaper or a chocolate bar, and there were instances of shoplifting. The (15) owners also got tired of children who rode their bicycles and skateboards up and down the corridor, even though it was forbidden, one reason why the corridor is absent from the latest plan.

Let’s move on to (16) what’s set in stone, so to speak- (16) things that the council insists upon. Cato and Brown are adding a third jetty for the new ferry service to Green Island. With a permanent community on the island, it’s profitable to run a ferry. The council hopes the wharf will generate much of its own income, so this third jetty is not up for discussion. Likewise, (16) renovation has to be done to parts of the wharf that no longer meet safety standard, like the weather or rotten posts and planks; and, the wooden eastern walkaway will be almost entirely replaced.

Narrator Before you listen to the rest of the talk, you have 30 seconds to read questions 17 to 20.

Now I’d like to spend a few minutes outlining the redesign of the space inside the wharf building.

Firstly, public comment was made during the initial planning phase, so the only input we’re asking for now relates to the (17) public space where there used to be a bookshop and a food outlet. Probably toilets will go there, along with seats, vending machines, plants, and sculptures. [Crack IELTS with Rob] We’re hoping local artists will submit ideas for artworks, and that the plants will be native.

As you can see from the plan, the size of the internal space remains the same, but the corridor will be subsumed into the floor space of the (17) public area and the (18) Thai restaurant in Shop 4. Access to the shops will be (19) external only, via the eastern and western walkways. I think the (20) bicycle shop, next to the café, made a submission against (19) external access, (15) requesting the corridor be retained, but this was rejected.

OK. Let’s have another drink while we discuss parking at the wharf…

Narrator You now have 30 seconds to check your answers.

That is the end of Part 2.

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Part 3:

You will hear two students talking about their post-graduate research.

Before you listen, you have 30 seconds to read questions 21 to 25.

Vanessa Hey, Marcus, how are you?

Marcus I’m really well.

Vanessa I thought you were in South Africa.

Marcus I was until a month ago. I came back to do a PhD.

Vanessa D’you know what you’re getting into? I’m writing a Master’s thesis, and it’s driving me crazy.

Marcus Oh dear.

Vanessa I heard you had an amazing job in a national park. Why would you give that up?

Marcus (21) It’s true, I started out working in a national park, looking after ostriches, and it did seem like my dream job. But, almost by accident, I got involved in taking DNA samples from the birds. I ended up analyzing the samples, myself, in a lab in Cape Town.

(21) It was incredible- working in the lab. Suddenly, I realized I had greater ambitions than being a park ranger.

Vanessa Well, well.

What was the DNA for?

Marcus You see, ostriches are part of a group of flightless birds called ratites, and there’s a mystery in omithology about how they spread around the globe when they can’t fly.

Vanessa That is weird.

Marcus There’s one hypothesis that they originated in Gondwanaland- a supercontinent that moved apart from Pangaea between (22) 200 and 120 million years ago.

Vanessa Didn’t Gondwanaland separate into Australia, Africa, and South America?

Marcus That’s right. Plus Antarctica and India.

The theory is that ratites stayed on the drifting landmasses, which would account for their present distribution. In the opposing hypothesis, borne out in the (26) fossil record, ratites originated in the northern supercontinent, called Laurasia. [Crack IELTS with Rob] Then, they flew south, but lost the ability (23) to fly around 50 million years ago.

Vanessa Which theory do you flavour?

Marcus I’m keen on the Gondwanaland one because DNA analysis shows ostriches are the oldest of the ratites, and, according to geologists, Africa broke away from Gondwanaland (24) first. Also, DNA analysis of the extinct elephant bird of Madagascar and the kiwi of New Zealand suggests they’re close relatives, so it’s unlikely they became flightless (25) independently.

Vanessa But isn’t the (26) fossil record more record reliable?

Marcus Not really. It’s open to interpretation.

Narrator Before you listen to the rest of the conversation, you have 30 seconds to read questions 27 to 30.

Marcus How’s your research going?

Vanessa Not so well, I’m afraid.

Marcus I presume you’re doing a Master’s in Public Health.

(27-28) What’s the topic of your thesis?

Vanessa Well, that was my first problem. It’s changed about 20 times. Currently, I’m looking at fathers’ visiting habits in neonatal wards.

Marcus Remind me how old neonatal babies are.

Vanessa Up to fours weeks.

Marcus And what’s the aim of your research?

Vanessa I’d like to propose a change to hospital policy. I think limited access by fathers to their newborns would improve the health of infants and their mothers, especially in intensive care.

Marcus Whoa! That’s a radical idea. Letting the family be part of the birth process has been standard practice in hospitals for 40 years.

Vanessa And because of that I chose a quantitative research methodology.

Marcus You’ll have to tell me what that is again as well.

Vanessa Quantitative research collects data can be explained numerically. It’s used to determine general trends.

Marcus Uh huh.

Vanessa (27-28) But, my next obstacle was that I could’s get a large enough sample of paternal behavior to analyze it quantitatively.

Marcus Why not?

Vanessa (29-30) Four of the hospitals I approached refused me access to their patients. I did get permission from two others, where I used to work, but the results of my survey were so scattered I couldn’t model anything.

Marcus So, what did you do?

Vanessa I opted for a quantitative approach. [Crack IELTS with Rob] I gave up large data collection, and did in-depth interviews with a handful of fathers. At the same time, (29-30) I set up an online discussion group for fathers.

Marcus How did that go?

Vanessa (29-30) Frankly, it was too slow to be useful. I’ve got to finish my thesis by the end of the year, and (29-30) managing the website took too much time.

Marcus Have you considered regression analysis? That is, determining the strength of the relationship between variables. It’s used for things like trying to prove that video games lead to more violence among young viewers.

Vanessa Yes, I have. In fact, I’ve changed supervisors, and my new one has guided me towards regression analysis, so at last I’m making progress.

Narrator You now have 30 seconds to check your answers.

That is the end of Part 3.

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Part 4:

You will hear a lecture on searching for planets similar to Earth.

Before you listen, you have 45 seconds to read questions 31 to 40.

Lecturer For hundreds of years, people have wondered whether other planets could sustain human life. Twentieth-century space missions cast doubt over colonization of our own solar system, but there’s plenty of hope beyond.

Distant bodies orbiting far-away stars are known as exoplanets. Since 1996, thousands of exoplanets have been found, most of which are massive hot balls of gas, like Jupiter. However, a new US mission is focusing on (31) smaller planets, one-half to twice the size of Earth. These must also be enough for their star to be in a (32) habitable zone.

Today, I’d like to discuss NASA’s Kepler Mission, which began in 2009 and is ongoing.

But first, who was Kepler? Well, Johannes Kepler lived from 1571 to 1630 mostly in what is now Germany. He was a physicist, astronomer, and optician. He was the first person to explain planetary motion correctly, and more importantly, he developed a way of working in which he sought to prove that theories must be universal, verifiable, and precise. This is known as (33) the scientific method.

I do think it is fitting that a tiny spacecraft is named after a giant of astronomy.

NASA’s Kepler satellite is small and relatively simple. [Crack IELTS with Rob] Other telescopes, like Hubble, provide exciting data, (34) but Kepler surveys just one area of the galaxy- the constellations Cygnus and Lyrae- and records events over several years. It has already identified around 1,000 new planets, and provides data on another 3,000 potential planets.

Kepler is powered by a solar array. Its largest instrument is a photometer- (35) a sensor that measures the light emitted by more than 100,000 stars. The photometer is so sensitive it can detect a drop in brightness when a planet moves, or transits, in front of s star, of one part in 10,000. This is like recording the decreased brightness of a car headlight when a small insect flies across it.

When a planet transits, NASA’s computers graph the curving light from the star. Regular, repeated dips in the curve could indicate a new planet. A smaller dip, (36) when a planet passes behind its star, creates reflections. Scientists can draw conclusions about the planet’s atmosphere from these reflections, because, as Kepler knew, the laws of physics and chemistry are universal- even way out in space. For example, light is absorbed by different atoms at different wavelengths, so a light signature provides data on a planet’s atmosphere. Hydrogen, carbon, oxygen, sodium, and other elements have been identified in new planets. However, the proportion of their composition is uncertain, making the detection of water difficult.

But back to the Kepler data, and some recent candidates for human habitation.

In 2013, a star named Kepler 62 was found with two planets in its (32) habitable zone. At first, these were considered similar to Earth, but on further analysis, each planet’s (37) mass was found to be several times greater than that of Earth. Their gravity might be strong enough to pull in helium and hydrogen gas, but this makes them similar to Neptune rather than Earth.

The following year, a star called Kepler 186 came under scrutiny. Its fifth planet, known as Kepler 186f, seemed a more likely candidate. With a diameter of 14,000 kilometers, it is roughly (38) ten percent wider than Earth. It orbits close enough to Kepler 186 for it to be temperate, allowing water to flow at the surface.

Smaller than the planets orbiting Kepler 62, Kepler 186f is more likely to have similar gravity to Earth’s and a rocky surface, perhaps containing iron, ice, and liquid water. At the outer edge of the habitable zone, its surface may freeze, as it receives one-sixth of the light from its star that Earth does come from the Sun. On the other hand, with a greater mass, Kepler 186f may have a thicker atmosphere, providing sufficient (39) insulation. This has led astronomers to dub Kepler 186f ‘Earth’s cousin’, not its twin.

But I can hear you thinking, OK, there are planets out there that sound Earth-like, but can we reach them? Currently: No. In the near to medium-term future? Afraid not.

The only known man-made object to have left the solar system is the unmanned Voyager 1 probe. [Crack IELTS with Rob] This happened in late 2013, and it had taken 37 years to travel from Earth. Voyager travels at around 61,000 kilometers per hour. Kepler 186f is about (40) 500 light-years away. At Voyager’s current speed, it takes 17,400 years to travel a single light-year, or 8.7 million years for the journey from Earth to Kepler 186f. The Space Shuttle, the only speedy manned spacecraft, is far slower than Voyager, with speeds of just 45,000 kilometers per hour, meaning a twelve-million-year journey!

Meantime, the Hubble Telescope is investigating a suitable planet called GJ124b, at a distance of 40 light-years away. But whether a planet is 40 or (40) 500 light-years away is immaterial.

Humans have always reached for the stars. Kepler the man, and Kepler the spacecraft have raised the possibility of human habitation: only our transport remains primitive.

Narrator That is the end of the Listening test.

You now have ten minutes to transfer your answers to your answer sheet.