The Official Cambridge Guide to IELTS Practice Test 8

recording 67 you will hear a telephone conversation between two people kathy and john john hopes to volunteer at a retirement home first you have some time to look at questions one to ten hello hillary lodge retirement home kathy speaking hello my name is john shepard could I ask? If you're the house manager, that's, well, hello Cathy, a friend of mine volunteers at Hillary Lodge and I'd like to help you out too if you need more people. I work part time, so I have plenty. of free time we are always happy to receive more help, John, could I tell you about some of the activities that volunteers participate in?

Please, on Monday nights we organize computer courses, we have six laptops and five or six residents attend the sessions. Regularly now everyone can write and send emails, but our trainer just moved and we need two or three volunteers who can help residents create documents, simple things. I really, certainly would be interested in doing great on Tuesday. In the afternoons we have an informal singing class that most residents attend. We have a keyboard and someone who plays, but if you want to join in singing you would be welcome. I work on Tuesdays at the moment, although that could change, I'll have to let it go for now, I'm afraid ok, so on Thursday mornings we usually have a session in our garden.

Several of our residents enjoy learning about flowers, where they grow best, how to care for them, etc. Is it something that interests you? I'm not an expert, but I enjoy gardening, so yes, I would like to participate. Do you have your own tools at home? We have some, but not many. I could bring some. When I come, thank you very much. One very important thing for volunteers is that we hold a monthly meeting where everyone meets with the staff. It's an opportunity to make sure we're working well together and that everyone knows what the residents are like.

What is happening at home now? Obviously, we would need to meet you before you become one of our volunteers. Of course, could you come for an informal interview later this week? I might be busy the next few days, but I would do it on Saturday. It's certainly possible, just stop by anytime during the day. I won't be working then, so you'll see my assistant Marrade. Sorry, how do you spell it? It's m a i r e a d Marade. Okay, not a name I'm familiar with. Oh, it's an Irish name, she comes from Dublin, of course, and the road Hillary Lodge is on is called Bridge Road, isn't it?

Number 73. Good. Oh, another thing that might interest you. We will be holding a couple of open days and we still need to. Any volunteers, if available, what are the dates? There is one on April 9 and another on May 14. They are both Saturday and all-day events. I can certainly organize May 14. I have another commitment on April 14. On the 9th, that would be a big help, we will have several guest artists, singers, a brass band, etc., and we expect a lot of visitors, so one possibility is to help look after the artists or you could spend an hour or so organizing. people as they arrive and then be part of the team making sure everything goes well.

Will I show people where they can park? Thank you. One reason to hold open days is to get publicity for Hillary Lodge locally so they can be found. I have someone from a newspaper who wants to interview you. They will want to hear from two or three people why they volunteer to help in a home. We're trying to get a TV station to come too, but they don't seem very interested. You don't mind being interviewed, well, if you come to chat, since we agreed, take it from there. Thank you very much for calling me, it's my pleasure, goodbye, that's the end of section one.

Now you have half a minute to check your answers. Skip to section two. You will hear from the director of a center that offers evening classes for adults. She will explain some recent changes that have been made to the center. First, you will have time to review questions 11 to 15. Hello, as some of you know. I'm elaine marriott, director of the university's learning resource center. We have invited everyone who takes evening classes and leisure activities to come and see the changes we have made to the center over the last month. An important change we have made. Here on the ground floor is the layout, as you can see by looking around.

I'm sure you'll recognize the desk that's still in the same spot as it has to be right inside the door, but you'll see that the periodicals are now on the shelves in the corner behind the desk, we've moved them closer to the door. entrance because a lot of people like to come in just to read magazines, we now have a much wider variety of periodicals than before, so we have decided to separate them from the newspapers, this means that the newspapers are now right on the other side of the stairs, near the study area. Another thing is that we have brought the computers downstairs, people used to complain about having to go upstairs to use them, so now they are On the other side of the building on the right, in the corner facing the parking lot, we now have an additional photocopier, so that in addition to the one above, there is one below.

You can see it right in front of the entrance, next to the back wall. However, the biggest change and one that I'm sure many of you will appreciate is that we now finally have a coffee shop that we've been asking for for years. If you turn right as soon as you pass the desk, you will see At the door in front of you it became possible to have a cafeteria because the building was expanded and we now have a new office and warehouse area. What else should I tell you before taking a walk? Oh yes, we have had so many requests.

For sports books, we have purchased many more and they are all together immediately to the right of the entrance. Before you listen to the rest of the conversation, you'll have some time to look at questions 16-20. Now listen and answer questions 16-20. Okay, that's enough with the new layout, we'll get into that in a moment, but first to do something with the people who are here to help you, of course, all the staff will do their best to answer your questions, but now. We will each specialize in certain areas, so if you ask a member of staff about something and they don't think they can help you enough, they will direct you to our specialist.

Jenny Reed is the person who can see if there are movies. She would like us to stock as she has taken the responsibility of purchasing them. She'd better warn you that our budget is limited, so I'm afraid we can't promise to buy everything you ask for. Phil Penshurst can help you improve your writing, if he needs to produce reports for your course you can book a half hour session with Phil to get started and then if you want more help he will arrange follow up sessions with you. I should mention Tom Salisbury, many people are interested in doing research. or just read about this region, people's occupations change over the years, etc.

Tom is a specialist in this particular field, so if he needs help, he can point you in the right direction. We have a large collection of relevant documents from antiquity. maps for wildlife surveys we have a new member of staff syed actor i am sure you will meet him soon and find him very useful if you are unemployed and want some advice on the practical aspects of looking for work saeed is the person to talk to. He has also written a very useful book on the subject which, of course, we have on our shelves. Many of you will know Shilpa Desai, who has been working here for about five years.

Shilpa now has the added responsibility of providing information. and advice on anything to do with housing, like finding out what's available or whether you're eligible for financial help. Well, that's enough from me, so let's walk through the library at the end of section two. Now you have half a minute to check your answers now move on to section three, you will hear a tutor and a student discussing a project that the student is working on first, you have some time to review questions 21 to 27, right, Stuart, Well, I have read the draft of your report on your job placement. at the central museum association it sounds like you had an interesting time so you ended up making a film for them yes, it was a film to train employees of different museums in the techniques they should use to label ancient objects without damaging some of them are really fragile okay so in your report you go over the main stages of making the film let's look in a little more detail you had to find a location somewhere to shoot the film which took quite a few days because I had I had to look at different museums around the country, but I had made time for it and, although it was the middle of winter, there was no snow, so I didn't have any transportation problems, right?

Did you have to decide what equipment you would need? the filming, yeah, I think they were quite surprised at how well I managed it, which was just a matter of luck, I had actually done that project with you last year, about recording technology, so you knew a little bit about that from that moment, yeah, what? It was very difficult for me to write the script. I had a deadline for that, but the association had to extend it. I couldn't have done it. Otherwise it would have helped if you had some training there. I think you're right.

I probably needed that, yes, right now, from your draft report, it seems that you had one or two problems deciding who was actually going to appear in the video, the casting, yes, I expected that the people who worked for the association would be very interested to take part, but they weren't, the problem was that they were all very busy and that meant that some of them had to travel, but Janice King, who I was reporting to for the project, oh, she was great, she arranged for the people had time off and for their work to cover, so it was a big help to me and it seems like the filming itself went well.

I assume you found a company that provided an online introduction to the techniques. Yes, it was very informative and very easy to use. I learned a lot. From there and then the editing, the association put me in touch with someone who works for one of the big film companies and I went down to the studio and sat with him in front of his computer for a day learning how to cut and paste. and deal with the soundtrack and stuff, so it was all no, I didn't include this in my draft report, but I had to design the cover of the DVD, as well as the lyrics and everything, have you done that kind of design work before ?

No, but I made a draft and then I talked about it with a couple of colleagues and they gave me some more ideas and when I finished it I showed it to the people who worked at the association and they liked it a lot. Excellent. listen and answer questions 28 to 30. Now, in addition to your own draft report, I also received a written evaluation from the association about the work you did during your placement and how it was beneficial to them. I realized that he hasn't. You included something about that in your report, but how did my project benefit the association?

You mean? So do I have to include that? Yeah, well, let's think, I guess if I hadn't made the movie for them, they would have had to get an outsider. company to do it, but because I was actually working for the association, I had a much better idea of ​​what their goals are, things like their responsibility for the preservation of exhibits, I don't think an outside company would have had that understanding. They would have been more indifferent and the association also said that because of his background, he had a good idea of ​​where to go to get the best deal for the equipment he needed.

They said the cost savings made it worth it despite purchasing it. it took quite a while yes that's true, the association also said that making the film had a very positive effect in getting staff to work more closely. Oh, I hadn't heard that was good and certainly people weren't afraid to tell me what they thought while I was making it, so I was able to get a lot of feedback at each stage which was helpful to me, but also meant the final product worked better. for them. Can you think of any other benefits? Well, I don't think they had really thought about what they would do with the movie once it was made.

I made quite a few suggestions for the layout. Other people we could send it to, as well as museum staff. Yes, they mentioned that it's fine, well, it certainly seems that way. That's the end of section three. You now have half a minute to check your answers. Now move on to section four. You will hear a lecture about a species of bird called the New Caledonian crow. First you have time to look at questions 31 to 40. Now listen carefully and answer questions 31 to 40. Today I am going to talk about research on a particular species of bird, the New Caledonian crow, whose natural habitatThey are small islands in the Pacific Ocean and it seems that these crows are exceptionally clever at using sticks. or other tools for finding food are not unknown among birds and animals, some chimpanzees, for example, are known to hit nuts against stones to break the shell and get to the edible grain inside.

A New Caledonian crow named Betty bent a straight wire to form a hook and used it to lift a small bucket of her favorite food from a vertical tube. This experiment was the first time she was presented with a wire, which makes it very impressive. Another crow named Barney has demonstrated the ability of him using sticks to search for food. In one research project, scientists from New Zealand and Oxford gave captive New Caledonian crows a three-stage problem: If they wanted to extract food from a hole, the crows first had to pull a rope to get a short stick and then use that short stick to get it out. a long stick from a toolbox and finally use the long stick to reach the food.

Surprisingly, they figured out how to do this. Other experiments carried out successfully at Oxford suggest that crows can also use sticks as tools to inspect all kinds of objects, possibly to assess whether they present danger or not. The idea for the experiment came from observing birds using tools to pick random objects, such as an image of a spider that was printed on a web. In this research, five pairs of crows, including Barney, were

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ed to see how they would react to a variety of objects that were carefully chosen so that the birds would not be tempted to view them as a possible food source as an additional precaution all the crows had been fed beforehand on eight occasions the first contact of a bird was through the use of a tool In all three

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s Barney started out using a stick for inspection one involved a rubber snake first he approached it but didn't touch it, then he retreated to grab a stick, then he poked it with the stick, after investigating a little more, Discarding the stick and continuing to peck at the snake with more confidence, apparently convinced that it wouldn't move in further experiments, two different birds called.

Pierre and Corbo also made a first approach with tools on three separate occasions, Pierre used a short piece of wood splinter to touch a flashing light and Corbeau was seen poking a metal toad with a stick, signifying that the crows They tended to use the sticks only to later make their first contact with the object, ignore the object or drop the tool and peck at the object, which is very different from using the tool to access food, so the conclusions we can be drawn from the research evidence they are accumulating from experiments. Like these, birds can plan their actions in advance, which is very interesting for understanding their cognition.

They do not seem to respond in a pre-programmed way. They may even be able to see. a problem and figuring out what the answer is, however, a major difficulty is assessing whether this tool-using behavior is a sign of intelligence, to some extent this is related to the ecological circumstances the animal is in, so that scientists want to know much more. about how crows behave in their native habitat and a team from the universities of Exeter and Oxford is carrying out research in New Caledonia. They are investigating whether the way birds forage for food gives them any possible evolutionary advantage.

Birds are difficult to observe. They live in a mountainous forest region, so researchers have placed small cameras on the tails of some birds as a method of investigating their behavior. Birds are experts at using sticks to find their food, particularly tree beta larvae. It is possible that birds can get so much energy from these worms that they only need to eat a few each day. This would mean that they would not have to spend most of their waking time searching for food, as most animals do. Beetle larvae have a different chemical composition. which can be traced through the feathers and blood of the birds that eat them.

Scientists have collected samples from crows to estimate the proportion of larvae in their diet. They should then be able to measure the extent to which individual birds rely on using sticks for feeding. We ourselves have learned a lot about the ability of New Caledonian crows to use tools and very interesting research is being carried out on them.