Read the passage: At first, the Chaudhry children were reluctant to accept their father's new rule that all mobile phones must be left in a basket by the door during dinner. Fourteen-year-old Saad argued that he needed to reply to his friends, and his sister Hira sulked through the first two meals in silence. By the second week, however, the conversation at the table had grown livelier. Their father told stories about his childhood in a village near Sargodha, and their mother taught them a card game after the dishes were cleared. Now it is often Hira who reminds visiting cousins to place their phones in the basket, and the family meal has become the part of the day everyone looks forward to.
Read the passage: In November 1895 the German physicist Wilhelm Rontgen was experimenting with electric currents passed through glass tubes containing very little air. Even though the tube was covered in black cardboard, he noticed that a nearby screen coated with a special chemical began to glow. Some invisible rays were clearly passing through the cardboard. Because their nature was unknown, he called them X-rays. Within weeks he had made a famous image showing the bones of his wife's hand and her wedding ring. Doctors quickly realised that the rays could reveal broken bones and objects lodged inside the body. In 1901 Rontgen received the first Nobel Prize ever awarded in physics.
Read the passage: In a mountain village in Gilgit-Baltistan, apricot trees produce far more fruit each summer than families can eat fresh, and much of it used to rot on the ground. Five years ago a group of women formed a cooperative to dry the surplus fruit on clean wooden racks instead of on rooftops, where dust and birds often spoiled it. They packed the dried apricots in sealed bags with simple printed labels and began selling them to shops in Gilgit and, later, in Islamabad. The income has paid for a sewing centre and school books for many children. Other villages in the valley have now asked the cooperative to train them in the same methods.
Correct answerB. Village women turned wasted fruit into a source of income for their community.
Read the passage: Elephants are known for their loud trumpeting, but much of their communication is far quieter, at least to human ears. They produce deep rumbles, many of which are too low in pitch for people to hear. These low-frequency sounds can travel several kilometres across open land, allowing scattered family groups to keep in touch and helping males and females find each other. Researchers believe elephants may also sense some of these vibrations through the ground, using sensitive nerve endings in their feet and trunks. When scientists first recorded these calls with special equipment, they found that herds that seemed to be moving silently were in fact holding constant conversations.
Correct answerC. People watching elephants may wrongly believe the animals are silent.
Read the passage: At his annual check-up, fifty-two-year-old Mr Hossain from Khulna was told that his blood pressure was too high. Rather than prescribing medicine straight away, his doctor asked him to try changing his habits for three months. Mr Hossain cut down on salty snacks and pickles, which he had been eating with almost every meal, and began walking for half an hour each evening along the riverbank. His wife started cooking with less salt and more vegetables. He also gave up smoking with the help of a local support group. At his next appointment, his blood pressure had fallen to a healthy level, and the doctor agreed that medicine was not needed for now.
Correct answerA. Try changing his habits for three months
Read the passage: Barcodes are now so ubiquitous that it is hard to find a packaged product without one. Yet the black and white stripes did not enter everyday use until the 1970s. In June 1974, at a supermarket in Ohio in the United States, a cashier scanned a packet of chewing gum, making it the first product sold using the new Universal Product Code. Each pattern of lines represents a number that identifies the product. When the code is scanned, the shop's computer looks up the item's name and price, adds it to the bill and updates the stock records. This speeds up queues, reduces pricing mistakes and helps shops know when to reorder goods.
Read the passage: When new medicines are tested, researchers usually divide volunteers into two groups. One group receives the real drug, while the other receives a placebo, a dummy pill that looks identical but contains no active ingredient. In the best-designed trials, neither the volunteers nor the doctors giving the pills know who is receiving which. This matters because people who believe they are being treated often report feeling better, even when they have taken only a sugar pill. This improvement, known as the placebo effect, can be surprisingly strong for symptoms such as pain. A new medicine is considered effective only if it produces clearly better results than the placebo.
Correct answerB. Without one, improvement caused by patients' expectations could be mistaken for the drug's effect.
Read the passage: Bamboo may look like a tree, but it is actually a giant member of the grass family. Some species are among the fastest-growing plants on Earth and can shoot up by tens of centimetres in a single day during the growing season. Unlike most trees, many bamboo plants send up new stems from the same underground root system after the old stems are cut, so harvesting does not require replanting. The hollow stems are light yet remarkably strong, which is why bamboo has been used for centuries across Asia for scaffolding, furniture, bridges and houses. Today, designers looking for alternatives to slow-growing timber are showing growing interest in bamboo floors, panels and even bicycle frames.
Correct answerD. It can be harvested repeatedly and regrows quickly without replanting.
Read the passage: When Jamal moved from his village in Rangpur to work in a garment factory near Dhaka, sending money home used to be difficult. He would wait until a cousin travelled back and hand over cash in an envelope, hoping it arrived safely. Now he simply opens an app on his phone and transfers money to his mother's mobile wallet in seconds. She collects the cash from a shopkeeper in the village who acts as an agent, or uses it to pay directly for seeds and school fees. The small fee for each transfer is far lower than the cost of a bus ticket. Jamal says the service has made him feel much closer to his family.
Correct answerC. Sending Money Home with a Few Taps
Read the passage: Thunder is the sound made by lightning. A lightning bolt heats the air along its path to temperatures several times hotter than the surface of the Sun in a tiny fraction of a second. The heated air expands so violently that it creates a shock wave, which we hear as a crack or a long rumble. Because light travels far faster than sound, we see the flash almost instantly but hear the thunder later. Sound covers roughly one kilometre in three seconds, so counting the seconds between flash and thunder and dividing by three gives a rough idea of how many kilometres away the storm is. If the gap is very short, it is wise to move indoors at once.
Correct answerC. Air expanding violently after being heated by lightning
Read the passage: When Farhan opened his restaurant in Hyderabad, the menu listed more than eighty dishes, from biryani to pasta. Customers took a long time to order, the kitchen struggled to keep so many ingredients fresh, and a good deal of food was thrown away each week. After a year of disappointing profits, he cut the menu to twenty dishes, mostly local favourites that his chef cooked particularly well. Orders now arrive faster, waste has fallen sharply, and online reviews frequently praise the consistency of the food. Farhan admits he was nervous that customers would miss the choice. Instead, he says, the restaurant has never been busier, and he has hired two more waiters.
Correct answerC. Offering fewer dishes can improve both quality and profits.
Read the passage: In an ordinary car, pressing the brake pedal squeezes pads against discs on the wheels, and the car's energy of motion is turned into heat that simply escapes into the air. Many electric and hybrid cars use a cleverer system called regenerative braking. When the driver slows down, the electric motor runs in reverse as a generator, harnessing some of the car's motion to produce electricity that is fed back into the battery. This recovered energy can then be used to drive the car further. Regenerative braking is especially effective in stop-start city traffic, where vehicles slow down frequently. It also reduces wear on the ordinary brakes, which are still fitted for sudden stops.
Read the passage: A primary school in Lucknow noticed that many pupils were missing lessons because of toothache. With the help of a local dental college, the school started a simple programme. Every child received a toothbrush and toothpaste, and after lunch each class brushed their teeth together for two minutes while a song played. Dental students visited twice a year to check pupils' teeth and teach them about the harm caused by sugary snacks and drinks. The school canteen replaced sweets with fruit and roasted chickpeas. After two years, the number of days lost to toothache had fallen by more than half, and teachers reported that pupils now reminded their own parents to brush at night.
Read the passage: The bicycle did not appear in a single moment of genius but developed step by step over most of the nineteenth century. In 1817 the German inventor Karl von Drais built a wooden 'running machine' with two wheels but no pedals; riders pushed it along with their feet. Later designs added pedals fixed directly to the front wheel, which led to the penny-farthing, with its huge front wheel and tiny rear one. Riding it was fast but dangerous. In the 1880s the so-called safety bicycle, with two wheels of similar size and a chain driving the rear wheel, made cycling far easier. When air-filled rubber tyres arrived soon afterwards, the basic shape of the modern bicycle was complete.
Correct answerB. The modern bicycle developed gradually through a series of improvements.
Read the passage: High above the Earth, a thin layer of ozone gas absorbs much of the Sun's harmful ultraviolet radiation. In 1985 British scientists reported that this layer was thinning dramatically over Antarctica each spring. The main cause was a group of chemicals called CFCs, then widely used in refrigerators and aerosol sprays. In 1987 governments signed the Montreal Protocol, an agreement to phase out these chemicals. Manufacturers developed substitutes, and the use of CFCs fell sharply over the following years. Because the chemicals linger in the atmosphere for decades, the damage did not disappear overnight. Nevertheless, scientists now report that the ozone layer is slowly healing and is expected to recover substantially within the coming decades.
Correct answerC. Coordinated action between countries can help reverse an environmental problem.
Read the passage: When Priya and her husband Arjun moved into their first flat in Chennai, they often reached the end of the month with almost no money left and no idea where it had gone. On a friend's advice, they began writing down every expense in a notebook for three months. The results surprised them. Food delivery orders, which they had thought of as an occasional treat, turned out to cost more than their electricity and water bills combined. They decided to cook at home on weekdays and order food only on Saturdays. They also opened a separate savings account and set up an automatic transfer of a fixed amount on the day their salaries arrived.
Read the passage: Marie Curie's achievements are all the more remarkable given the obstacles she faced. Born in Warsaw in 1867, she could not attend university in her homeland because it did not admit women, so she studied secretly before moving to Paris. There, working in a leaky shed with little funding, she and her husband Pierre discovered two new elements, polonium and radium. In 1903 she became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, and in 1911 she won a second, this time in chemistry. She remains the only person to have won Nobel Prizes in two different sciences. Her determination and brilliance continue to inspire young scientists around the world more than a century later.
Read the passage: During the festival season, an electronics shop in Rawalpindi placed a large banner outside offering televisions at 'half price'. The offer drew crowds, but many shoppers discovered that only three televisions were available at that price, and they had been sold within the first hour. Sales staff then guided disappointed customers towards more expensive models, pointing out their larger screens and longer guarantees. Kamran, a college student who had queued since early morning, left empty-handed and annoyed. His economics teacher later explained that some shops use a heavily discounted item as a lure to bring people through the door, hoping they will spend money on other goods once inside.
Read the passage: You do not need an expensive gym membership to become healthier. Walking briskly for thirty minutes on most days of the week can strengthen your heart, help control your weight and lift your mood. It requires no special equipment beyond a comfortable pair of shoes, and it can easily be fitted into a busy day. Try getting off the bus one stop early, taking the stairs instead of the lift, or walking to the corner shop rather than riding a motorbike. Invite a friend or family member to join you, and the time will pass quickly. Start small if you need to, but start today. Your body will thank you for every step.
Correct answerB. To encourage readers to walk more as a simple way to improve their health
Read the passage: Mountain glaciers are slow-moving rivers of ice that form where more snow falls in winter than melts in summer. Over many years the snow is pressed into dense ice, which creeps downhill under its own weight. In many mountain ranges around the world, including parts of the Himalayas and the Alps, glaciers have been retreating for decades as average temperatures rise. Their lower ends, or snouts, now lie higher up the valleys than they did in the past, sometimes leaving behind lakes held back by loose piles of rock. Because glaciers release meltwater slowly during warm months, they help keep rivers flowing in dry seasons, so their loss could affect water supplies for millions of people downstream.
