2. Read and translate the text:

A typical flowering plant consists of two parts – the root system and the shoot system.

The main functions of the root system are to anchor the plant in the ground and to absorb water and mineral salts; the main functions of the shoot system are to manufacture food and produce flowers and seeds. In order to examine the root system pull up some plant carefully and wash the roots. You will see that it has a main root which grows straight downwards into the soil, branching from it numerous lateral roots. This whole mass of roots is called the root system.

In some plants the main root may serve to store food. In other plants such as the grasses there is no clearly defined main root but a number of roots of the same size. Such a system is called fibrous.

The shoot system consists of a branched stem bearing leaves, buds and perhaps flowers and fruits.

The stem is erect, cylindrical and strong. The lower part is woody while the upper part is green, more tender and hairy. For some distance above ground level there are no leaves but tiny leaf scars left when the leaves withered and fell off. The leaves are arranged spirally round the stem; the part of the stem to which the leaf is attached is called a node and the part between two leaves is an internode.

At the top of the stem, if there are no flowers, the leaves are small, very close together and form a bud.

The main functions of the stem are to support the leaves and flowers and to carry materials from the roots to the leaves and vice versa. In some plants stems are also used to store food.

The main functions of the leaf are to manufacture food for the plant and to permit the exchange of gases between the plant and the air.

3. Answer the questions:

1. What parts does a typical flowering plant consist of?

2. What are the main functions of the root system?

3. What are the main functions of the shoot system?

4. What do we call fibrous?

5. How are the leaves arranged round the stem?

6. What are the main functions of the stem?

7. Whose functions are to manufacture food for the plant and to permit the exchange of gases between the plant and the air?

35 36

Animal – plant differences

1. Lexics to the text:

1. either … or – лиибо … либо, или … или

2. place organisms – отнести организмы (распределить)

3. kingdom – мир

4. nutritional – питательный

5. to require – требовать

6. complex compounds –сложные соединения

7. to depend on – зависить от

8. to take place – происходить

9. to carry out – осуществлять, проводить

10. to take in – питаться

11. protoplasm – протоплазма

12. cellulose – клетчатка

13. furthermore – к тому же

14. vacuoles – вакуоли

15. sap – сок (растений)

16. disc-shaped – дискообразный

17. chloroplasts – хлоропласты

18. nucleus – ядро

2. Read and try to understand the text:

Although you may place organisms without difficulty in either the plant or the animal kingdom, it is essential to know the basic nutritional differences between these two groups.

Plants require sunlight energy to build up their complex organic compounds (starch, for example) from the simplier inorganic foods they absorb. This process is not only dependent on sunlight, but requires the presence of the green pigment chlorophyll, and a supply of water and carbon dioxide within the plant, before it can take place. Animals do not carry out such synthesis; they take in ready-made organic compounds by feeling on other organisms either living or dead. Thus, feeding plants are the only organisms capable of making organic compounds and animals are dependent on them, either directly or indirectly, for their supply of these substances.

Animals also differ from plants in the structure of their cells. Those of animals are bounded by a very thin layer of special protoplasm (a protoplasmic membrane), those of plants have a much thicker layer of dead material outside the protoplasmic membrane. This thick layer (the cell wall is usually made of an organic substance called cellulose. Furthermore, plant cells generally have spaces or vacuoles full of cell sap within their protoplasm. Chlorophyll is not found in animal cells, but is present in small disc-shaped bodies (chloroplasts) in the protoplasm of many plant cells.

The nucleus is a more or less spherical body present in both cell types.