Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
Film is an illusion because the moving pictures seen on the screen are not moving at all. A film is actually a series of tiny still pictures, or frames. They appear to be moving because the retina of the human eye retains the impression of an object for a split second after that object has actually disappeared. This principle is known as the persistence of vision. When we look at a single frame of film, the image persists in the brain’s visual center for a fraction of a second.
Then, the next frame comes along and the brain has to catch up with the new image. Thus, our eyes and brain trick us into thinking that we see a smoothly moving image rather than a series of still ones.
Another illusion of film is known collectively as special effects, the tricks and techniques that filmmakers use when makeup, costume, and stunts are still not enough to make a scene convincing. Special-effects artists apply science to filmmaking, showing us things that no plain camera could ever photograph. Even since the introduction of computer graphics in recent decades, the films of today still rely on some special effects that have existed since the early years of cinema.
One category of special effects is called optical or visual effects, tricks made with the camera. One of the pioneers of optical effects was the French filmmaker Georges Melies, who invented a technique called stop-motion photography. With this technique, a scene is filmed, the camera is stopped, the scene is changed in some way, and then the camera rolls again. Stop- motion photography can create the illusion of an actor disappearing on screen. In one short film, an actor’s clothes keep returning to his body as he tries to get undressed. Melies also invented a technique known as split screen. By putting a card over the camera lens, he prevented half of the frame of film from being exposed. He filmed a scene on the uncovered half of the frame and then backed up the same strip of film in his camera. For the second shot, he covered the exposed half and took another series of pictures on the half that had been covered the first time. With the technique of split screen, it is possible to achieve illusions such as having the same actor play twins.
Mechanical effects are another category of special effects. Mechanical effects are objects or devices used during the filming to create an illusion, such as feathers or plastic chips to simulate snow, and wires to create the illusion that people are flying. Many sound effects are mechanical effects. Wood blocks create a horse’s hoofbeats, and a vibrating sheet of metal sounds like thunder. During the silent film era, the music machine called the Kinematophone was popular because it could produce the sounds of sirens, sleigh bells, gunfire, baby cries, and kisses—all at the press of a key.
Other mechanical effects are puppets, robots of all sizes, and tiny copies of buildings or cities. To reduce the cost of studio sets or location photography, special-effects technicians create painted or projected backgrounds, which replace the set or add to it. For example, in a long shot of a town, the set might be only a few feet high, and the remainder of the town is painted onto a sheet of glass positioned in front of the camera during filming. In a 1916 silent film called The Flying Torpedo, mechanical effects created the appearance of an enemy invasion of the California seacoast. Technicians threw small contact—rigged explosives into toy cities, scattering the tiny buildings into the air. An artist painted a row of battleships on a board that was only six feet long. Carpenters drilled small holes in the ships, which were filled with small charges of flash powder to simulate guns. An electrician wired the charges so they could be fired on cue from a small battery. For audiences

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Many countries in Asia agreed to _____ diplomatic relations.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions:
    Who talks more - men or women? Most people believe that women talk more. However, linguist Deborah Tannen, who has the studied the communication style of men and women, says that this is a stereotype. According to Tannen, women are more verbal - talk more - in private situations, where they use conversation as the “glue’ to hold relationships together. But, she says, men talk more in public situations, where they use conversation to exchange information and gain status. Tannen points out that we can see these difference even in children. Little girls often play with one ‘best friend’ and their play includes a lot of conversation. Little boys often play games in groups, their play usually involves more doing than talking. In school, girls are often better at verbal skills, while boys are often better at mathematics.
    A recent study at Emory University helps to shed light on the roots of this difference. Researchers studied conversation between children aged 3-6 and their parents. They found evidence that parents talk very differently to their sons than they do to their daughters. The startling conclusion was that parents use more language with their girls. Specifically, when parents talk with their daughters, they use more descriptive language and more details. There is also far more talk about emotions, especially with daughters than with sons.

Which sentence best expresses the main idea of the second paragraph?

Fill in each numbered blank with one suitable word or phrase

There are many reasons (1) _____ taking regular time with our family is important:

It (2) _____ a place to listen, teach, learn, and (3) _____ ourselves freely and safely. It provides (4) _____ to discuss family joys, issues, and problems. Family members can practice skills in a non-threatening (5) _____. Families are a (6) _____ part of our society and the fabric of our communities - we spend (7) _____ time together to get our feelings (8) _____ belonging, our values, support and understanding. It helps (9) _____ family members together and feel safe in today's world where (10) _____ can lead to family disintegration.

(7) ________

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Any change in one part of an ecosystem can cause changes in other parts. Droughts, storms and fires can change ecosystems. Some changes (1) _______ ecosystems. If there is too (2)_____ rainfall, plants will not have enough water to live. If a kind of plant dies off, the animals that feed on it may also die or move away. Some changes are good for ecosystems. Some pine forests need fires for he pine trees to reproduce. The seeds are sealed inside pinecones. Heat from a forest fire melts the seal and lets the seeds (3) _______. Polluting the air, soil, and water can harm ecosystems. Building (4) _______ on rivers for electric power and irrigation can harm ecosystems around the rivers. Bulldozing wetlands and cutting down forests destroy ecosystems. Ecologists are working with companies and governments to find better ways of (5) _______ fish, cutting down trees, and building dams. They are looking for ways to get food, lumber, and other products for people without causing harm to ecosystems

 Singapore plays an active role in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, of that Singapore is a founding member.

(tìm lỗi sai )

(520)________

Conservation, sustainable use and protection of (1) _______ resources including plants, animals, mineral deposits, soils, clean (2) _______, clean air, and fossil fuels such as coal, petroleum, and natural gas. Natural (3) _______ are grouped into two categories, renewable and nonrenewable. A (4) _______ resource is one that may be replaced over time by natural processes, (5) _______ fish populations or natural vegetation, or is inexhaustible, such as solar energy.

(32)______

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There/ compass/ sleeping bag/ and/ some plasters/ in/ their backpack.

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Space Tourism
If you are like most people, you probably dream of spending your next vacation sightseeing or relaxing in a tropical spot. But pretty soon, you may have the option of blasting into space and exploring the universe. It appears that space tourism may start to experience a boom that is sure to be out of this world. Since ancient times, humans have surely dreamed about visiting space. However, it was just a fantasy until 1961, when Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person to fly into space. Yet in the years following, only a few highly-trained Soviet and American astronauts managed to leave the Earth’s atmosphere. In the mid-1980s, the US began to relax some of its restrictions. In 1986, an engineer named Charles Walker became the first non-government employee to fly into space. A year later, an American teacher named Christa McAuliffe was chosen to be the first teacher in space. Unfortunately, the Space Shuttle she was on, The Challenger, crashed during takeoff, killing everyone on board. Space tourism got an unexpected boost from the collapse of the Soviet Union. With Russia’s space programme in dire need of money, it became open to offers for space tourism. In 1990, a Japanese reporter was allowed to fly with a Russian crew into space, but the trip would cost his employer $28 million. In the late 1990s, a private company, MirCorp, started organizing trips to space for wealthy individuals. Now, many other companies are trying to do the same. Still, most people who want to become space tourists face a major barrier: the price. Early space tourists have paid dozens of millions of dollars for a seven-to- ten-day stay outside the Earth. However, there are some indications that the price will come down in the near future. Some corporations are gearing up for this with big plans to make space a more hospitable place. The luxurious hotel chain Hilton has expressed interest in opening a space hotel in the next 15 to 20 years. Meanwhile, some experts believe that flights to and from the moon could become a common occurrence within a few decades. Hopefully someday soon we will all have the chance to get to know our solar system a little bit better.
7. What does the passage imply about the future of space tourism?

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions :
Earthquakes are one of the scariest natural phenomena because they are so unpredictable. Scientists have tried to come up with a method to predict them but they have always failed. Unlike other destructive phenomena such as hurricanes or even solar storms, earthquakes come without any (1)_________ whatever. Some people believe that animals are able to (2)________ when earthquakes are coming. There are many anecdotes about dogs barking before an earthquake happens. In some cases, strange phenomena have been observed in creatures like toads, where a few days before a major earthquake hit, they left their breeding ground. The toads did not reappear (3)_________ the quake had happened.Another strange creature that some believe may hold the key (4)________ quakes is the oarfish. These strange fish normally live in very deep water. (5)_________ of these fish are very rare, but in 2013, oarfish were found to beach themselves in San Francisco, and this caused some to believe that a major earthquake was coming. What was the reason for this?

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Although only a small percentage of the electromagnetic radiation that is emitted by the Sun is ultraviolet (UV) radiation, the amount that is emitted would be enough to cause severe damage to most forms of life on Earth were it all to reach the surface of the Earth. Fortunately, all of the Sun’s ultraviolet radiation does not reach the Earth because of a layer of oxygen, called the ozone layer encircling the Earth in the stratosphere at an altitude of about 15 miles above the Earth. The ozone layer absorbs much of the Sun’s ultraviolet radiation and prevents it from reaching the Earth. Ozone is a form of oxygen in which each molecule consists of three atoms (O3) instead of the two atoms (O2) usually found in an oxygen molecule. Ozone forms in the stratosphere in a process that is initiated by ultraviolet radiation from the Sun. UV radiation from the Sun splits oxygen molecules with two atoms into free oxygen atoms, and each of these unattached oxygen atoms then joins up with an oxygen molecule to form ozone. UV radiation is also capable of splitting up ozone molecules; thus, ozone is constantly forming, splitting, and reforming in the stratosphere. When UV radiation is absorbed during the process of ozone formation and reformation, it is unable to reach Earth and cause damage there. Recently, however, the ozone layer over parts of the Earth has been diminishing. Chief among the culprits in the case of the disappearing ozone, those that are really responsible, are the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). CFCs meander up from Earth into the stratosphere, where they break down and release chlorine. The released chlorine reacts with ozone in the stratosphere to form chlorine monoxide (ClO) and oxygen (O2). The chlorine then becomes free to go through the cycle over and over again. One chlorine atom can, in fact, destroy hundreds of thousands of ozone molecules in this repetitious cycle, and the effects of this destructive process are now becoming evident.
8. The word "culprits" in paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to which of the following?

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celebrate / Independence / we / Day / second / September.

Read the following passage and mark the letter A, B, C, or D on your answer sheet to indicate the correct answer to each of the questions.

   My family consists of four people. There's my father whose name is Jan, my mother whose name is Marie, my brother, Peter and of course, me. I have quite a large extended family as well but, only the four of us live together in our apartment in a block of flats. My father is fifty-two years old. He works as an accountant in an insurance company. He is tall and slim, has got short brown and gray hair and blue eyes. My father likes gardening very much as well as listening to music and reading books about political science. His special hobbies are bird watching and travelling.

   Now I’ll describe my mother and my brother. My mother is forty-seven and she works as a nurse in a hospital. She is small, and slim, has short brown hair and green eyes. She likes bird watching and travelling too, so whenever my parents are able to they go someplace interesting for nature watching. Since we have a cottage with a garden they both spend a lot of time there. My brother is sixteen. He is slim and has short brown hair and blue eyes. He also attends high school. He is interested in computers and sports like football and hockey. He also spends a lot of time with his friends.

   I have only one grandmother left still living. She is in pretty good health even at the age of seventyeight so she still lives in her own flat. I enjoy spending time with her when I can. Both my grandfathers died from cancer because they were smokers, which was really a great tragedy because I didn't get chance to know them. My other grandmother died just a few years ago. I also have a lot of aunts, uncles, and cousins. The cousin I’m closest to is my uncle’s daughter Pauline. We have a lot in common because we are both eighteen and so we are good friends.

   My parents have assigned me certain duties around the house. I don't mind helping out because everyone in a family should contribute in some way. I help with the washing up, the vacuuming and the shopping. Of course I also have to help keep my room tidy as well. My brother is responsible for the dusting and mopping. He also has to clean his own room. Even though my brother and I sometimes fight about who has to do what job, we are still very close. I am also very close to my parents and I can rely on them to help me. My parents work together to keep our home well maintained and it seem they always have a project or another that they are working on. They respect each other's opinions and even if they disagree they can always come to a compromise. I hope in the future that 1 have a family like ours.

What does the writer’s brother do?

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Prehistoric mammoths have been preserved in the famous tar pits of Rancho La Brea (Brea is the Spanish word for tar) in what is now the heart of Los Angeles, California. These tar pits have been known for centuries and were formerly mine for their natural asphalt, a black or brown petroleum-like substance. Thousands of tons were extracted before 1875, when it was first noticed that the tar contained fossil remains. Major excavations were undertaken that established the significance of this remarkable site. The tar pits were found to contain the remains of scores of species of animals from the last 30,000 years of the Ice Age. Since then, over 100 tons of fossils, 1.5 million from vertebrates, 2.5 million from invertebrates, have been recovered, often in densely concentrated tangled masses. The creatures found range from insects and birds to giant ground sloths, but a total of 17 proboscideans (animals with a proboscis or long nose) - including mastodons and Columbian mammoths - have been recovered, most of them from Pit 9, the deepest bone-bearing deposit, which was excavated in 1914. Most of the fossils date to between 40,000 and 10,000 years ago. The asphalt at La Brea seeps to the surface, especially in the summer, and forms shallow puddles that would often have been concealed by leaves and dust. Unwary animals would become trapped on these thin sheets of liquid asphalt, which are extremely sticky in warm weather. Stuck, the unfortunate beasts would die of exhaustion and hunger or fall prey to predators that often also became stuck. As the animals decayed, more scavengers would be attracted and caught in their turn. Carnivores greatly outnumber herbivores in the collection: for every large herbivore, there is one saber-tooth cat, a coyote, and four wolves. The fact that some bones are heavily weathered shows that some bodies remained above the surface for weeks or months. Bacteria in the asphalt itself would have consumed some of the tissues of other than bones, and the asphalt itself would dissolve what was left, at the same time impregnating and beautifully preserving the saturated bones, rendering them dark brown and shiny.
1. What aspect of the La Brea pits does the passage mainly discuss?

Mrs. Pike ______ the door before the customers arrived.

(512)______

Mark the letter A, B, C, or D to indicate the sentence that best combines each pair of sentences in the following questions.
The Matrix was released in 1999. It stars Keanu Reeves.

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You can share your stamps ….. other collectors ……. a stamp club.

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Cleaning the World’s Oceans
Imagine taking a romantic walk on the beach with your loved one. As the sun begins to set, you hope to treasure this moment forever. Just then, your bare feet stumble over something and you hear a crack. You have just stepped upon a plastic soda bottle and some junk that the tide has washed ashore. Scenarios like this are happening more frequently due to an access amount of sea rubbish, and the worst of it is found far from land. The increasing accumulation of garbage in oceans is due to a number of factors. Studies suggest that 80 percent of all debris originated on land. The majority of this waste is in the form of plastics. This is particularly troublesome because plastic does not degrade at the same rate that other materials do. Therefore, these articles will remain there for quite some time. Some of the pollution is caused accidentally. For example, about 10,000 product-filled containers are lost at sea every year by freight ships. In other cases, the littering is more deliberate, such as the moment when people toss things into the water from boats or land. One of the most startling discoveries of recent years was an area which is now dubbed the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. It is a large collection of marine debris that collected in the North Pacific Ocean. Although the patch is quite massive, it is undetectable from satellites in space because most of the rubbish is underneath the surface. It was discovered in 1997 by a man who happened to spot it while returning home from a sailing race. The patch formed as a result of rubbish being carried by currents and then getting trapped in the area. Thankfully, the problem of ocean garbage is not being ignored. Organizations like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) are taking action. It has funded 76 projects that take an aggressive approach to eliminating sea rubbish. Since 2006, it has removed 3,814 metric tons of marine debris from oceans. Methods of rubbish removal include using machines that skim the surface of ocean waters and remove any drifting materials found. In addition, special traps are set by the mouths of rivers to snatch rubbish before it reaches the sea. If everyone does their part, sea rubbish seems like an issue that can be resolved.
4.  Which of the following statements about pollution in oceans is correct?

Many countries’ cultural _________is a result of talking in immigrants from all over the world.
(133)_______

Choose the best answer:
"Listen carefully", he said to us.

Read the reading below carefully, and then complete it with the best option A, B, C or D given below:
Nowadays people are more aware that wildlife all over the world is in danger. Many (1)________of animals are threatened, and could easily become (2)______ if we do not make an effort to protect them. There are many (3)_______ for this. In some cases, animals are hunted for their fur or for othervaluable parts of their bodies. Some birds, such as parrots, are caught (4)________and sold as pets. For many animals and birds, the problem is that their habitat - the (5)________where they live - is disappearing. More (6)________is used for farms, for houses or industry, and there are fewer open (7)________than there once were. Farmers use powerful chemicals to help them grow better (8)________, but these chemicals pollute the environment and (9)________wildlife. The most successful animals on earth - human beings - will soon be the only Ones left, unless we can (10)________this problem