Learning to learn in English

Comprehension check

1.Work with a partner. Match the verbs in A with the nouns in B. Some verbs may go with more than one noun.

Focus on Language

1. Translate these sentences into your native language. Do you need a dictionary to translate them correctly?

I’m sure she will make a good physician.

The climate model developed by climatologists forecasts dramatic changes in Europe as well as US.

International words vs “False friends”

The words mostly of Greek and Latin origin that are used in many other languages especially in different areas of science and technology are called international words, e.g. geometry, atom, mathematics, radio, integral, theorem, structure, etc.

Knowledge of such words helps a lot in reading and translation. However, there are the so called ‘false friends”. These are words that look like international but have different meanings in English and in Russian, e.g. to reclaim (to take back something that was yours), actual (real, existing in fact, etc), spectacles (a pair of eyeglasses), etc.

Practice

1.In the texts above find examplesof international and ‘false friends’ words and translate them into your native language. How many of them did you find?

2.Sortout thewordsbelowinto categories.Consult adictionaryifnecessary.

Lecture, battery, detail, form, control, accurate, technology, massive, magazine,fact,logic,pioneer,mixture,nature,repetition,general,argument, prospect, affect, problem, actual, technique, intelligent, example, original, paragraph,transparent,focus,lamp,list,test,category,primitive,cyberspace, combination,activity,priority,sodium,application,fabric,metal,guarantee, industry, type, location, material, vibration, phenomenon, physician, data, encyclopedia, menu, clay, system, correspondent, probe, familiar, unique, scheme, lava, to speculate, cabinet.

2.Read the sentence from the text. What other adjectives can go with the noun contribution?

Lomonosov made a significant contribution to the development of natural sciences.

Collocation

Collocation is the way words combine in a language to produce natural-sounding speech and writing. E.g., in English you say strong wind and heavy rain. It would be not normal to say *heavy wind or *strong rain.

Collocation runs through the whole of the English language. No piece of natural spoken or written English is totally free of collocation. For the student, choosing the right collocation will makehis speech and writing more natural, more native-speaker-like.

Practice

1.Look at the diagram with the words invention and discovery. See how many collocations you can make with these words.

sun’s atmosphere. Moreover,it helpedto revealnewelements such as helium. Above all, spectroscopy of atoms and molecules gave birth to quantum mechanics that is the basis of modern physics andchemistry.Today,laserspectroscopyisoneofthemostimportant experimental tools of condensed matter physics and it made a revolution in developing new materials with improved properties.

Listening

1.Before you listen answer the questions.

How many discoveries or inventions of the ancient world do you know?

How did they influence the development of science at that time?

Do people still use them?

Have any modern inventions or discoveries replaced them?

2.The words in A are in the story you are going to hear. Match a word in A with a definition in B.

3.Check if you know the meaning of these words and phrases. Consult a dictionary if necessary.

a gearwheel

a shipwreck

a fingerprint

sponge divers

4.Listen tothe radio programmeabout one ofthe ancient devicesand answer the questions.

a)What kind of device did the sponge divers find?

b)Where did they find it?

c)What surprised the scientists most?

d)According to the scientists how old is the device?

e)What is it like?

f)What was it used for?

g)How do scientists explain the long interval between the design of

Antikythera Mechanism and the advent of medieval gearwheel?

Get real

Search websites or popular science magazines to find information about two significant discoveriesor inventionsin your field ofscience made before the 20th century. Make notes on what you have found and report back to the class. Be sure to include

description

inventor / discoverer

scientific significance

Reading

1.Work with a partner. Name any accidental discoveries or inventions you have ever heard about. How did people benefit from them? Did they cause any problems?

2.The words in columnA are in the text you are going to read. Match them with the words in column B which are similar in meaning.

was watching. On reaching for the screen, Roentgen got his hand between the discharge tube and the screen and saw the bones of his own hand through the shadow of his skin. In 1901, Roentgen received the Nobel Prize for his accidental discovery of X-rays.

Alexander Fleming was a young bacteriologist at St. Mary’s Hospital in London in 1928. One day in his laboratory, he noticed that a culture dish of bacteria had been invaded by a mould* whose spore must have drifted in through an open window. Under the microscope, he saw that, all around the mould, the individual bacteria that he had been growing had burst. He saved the mould, and from it produced the first penicillin.

Although the mad scientists or eccentric inventors so often portrayed in old movies are still good for laughs, that’s not what we’re talking about here. Surely the need still exists for the imaginative and inventive experimenter.

(Adapted from “Unexpected scientific discoveries are often the most important” )

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*to thread – здесь, нанизывать

*circuit – здесь, замкнутая электрическая цепь

*mould – здесь, плесень

Comprehension check

1. Here are some answers. What are the questions?

Example: When and where was Luigi Galvani doing his investigations?

In 1791 at the University of Bologna.

a)_________________________________________________________? A puff of wind.

b)_________________________________________________________? To nerve impulses.

c)_________________________________________________________? Principle of vaccination.

d)_________________________________________________________? With electrical discharges.

e)_________________________________________________________? Barium compound.

f)_________________________________________________________? The bones of his own hand.

g) _________________________________________________________? In 1901.

i) _________________________________________________________? Bacteriologist.

h) _________________________________________________________? The first penicillin.

2. Sum up in your own words how the following discoveries were made.

What do you think?

Do you think these discoveries were absolutely unexpected? Why?/ Why not?

Why are scientists often portrayed asmad or eccentric experimenters?

Comment on the saying “The fortune likes those that are prepared”.

Focus on language

Read the sentences. What grammar tenses are used?

We were tired because we had been experimenting all day long.

AfterIhadworkedinthelabforafewweeks,IfeltIknewtheequipment pretty well.

They were making observations of the night sky for several years hoping to discover the planet they had calculated.

First students had a short talk with a lab instructor about safety in the lab and then they were allowed to work with some chemicals.

The lecture finished before we got there.

The lecture had already finished before we got there.

Past Simple, Past Progressive, Past Perfect and Past Perfect Progressive

We use … talk about an activity or situation that began and ended at a particular time in the past.

We use … to say that something was going on around a particular time in the past or a longer background action or situation which was interrupted by a shorter action.

We use … to speak about an action which happened before another past action.

We use … to talk about an action or event continuing up to a specific time in the past. We put the emphasis on ‘how long’.

Practice

1.List time expressions under the correct tense heading. Some expressions can be used more than once.

2. Complete the sentences with the correct Past tenses.

f) Kevinsuddenlyrealizedthat theteacher (ask)himaquestion.Hecouldn’t

Tool box: Agreeing and disagreeing

Opinions I think (that)… In my opinion… As for me…

Agreeing Absolutely; Right / That's right; I agree/ You’re right

Disagreeing I know, but… I take/see your point, but… I’m not sure…

That’s not true…

Writing

A competition wasannounced at your department to write a short article for

the university newspaper on the subject: “Great Events in Science.” Your

task is to focus on inventions and discoveries made before the 20th century.

Choose to write about a scientist who you think made the most significant contribution to the development of your field of science or science in general. Write anarticle of about 150 words. Make use of the texts about Lomonosov, Pascal and Edison as a model. Follow the guidelines:

give the article a title

introduce the subject

give some factual information

 give your opinion and some supporting information

In the Realm of Science

1.Words like volt and watt have become part of our language, e.g. a volt is the unit of electrical potential, a watt is a unit of electrical power. However, we sometimes forget that these are the names of famous scientists.Avolt is named afterAlessandroVolta (1745–1827), the Italian physicist. A watt is named after James Watt (1736–1819), the English inventor of a steam engine.

Do you know what these terms mean and who they are named after?

2. Remember how to say the names of some well-known scientists:

3. Arithmetic operation is a mathematical expression involving numbers.

4. Read and remember some mathematical symbols.

Unit 1 Progress Monitoring

In this unit you have worked on the following vocabulary related to the topic:

Tick(V) thepoints you areconfident about and cross (X) theones youneed to revise.

Breakthrough Implication

Breakthroughs of the 20th century

Anunprecedentedexplosionofcreativity,insight, andbreakthroughoccurred ineveryfieldofscienceinthelastcentury.Itstartedwithoutairplanes,television, computers and ended with spacecraft on Mars and a walk on the Moon along the way, the structure of DNA and a model of the atom, advances in particle physicsandcosmologyaswellaswirelessInternet.Thesediscoveriesprofoundly changed the way we understand the world and our place in it.

However, choosing the most important breakthroughs and inventions of the last 100 years is like choosing the most beautiful flower in a garden of roses. Picking the most important of anything is quite tricky. When one invention leads to the next, which is more important, the chicken or the egg? Some breakthroughs, like Einstein’s theory of relativity, redefined our understanding of the universe, while others had more impact on everyday life.

Since the 1940s, computers have provided a way to solve complex problems and penetrated nearly every aspect of our lives. The rise in the 1990s of the Internet, the World Wide Web and e-mail’s changing the way we gather information, communicate and shop. Programmable electronic devices of all sorts have come to spread to modern society to such a degree that future generations may well characterize the 20th century as the Computer Age.

Francis Crick and JamesWatson won a Nobel Prize after solving mystery of the human genetic coding called DNAin 1953. They discovered how the genes for recreating life were arranged in a double helix (spiral). Existing in every cell, DNA controls what we look like and our susceptibility and resistanceto diseaseand tellsourcellshowtoactto keepour bodiesfunctioning.

The first entirely synthetic plastic, Bakelite, was invented – by accident, as it happened – by American chemist Leo Baekeland in 1909. Early uses included radios, light sockets, jewelry, telephones, washing machines, fishing reels and guns. Later synthetics, like cellophane, nylon and Teflon, brought revolution of their own.

From the launching of the first satellite in 1957 – Sputnik – to man’s walk on the moon 12 years later to today’s sophisticated telescopes, shuttles

and tripsto Mars, spaceexplorationhasopeneda new frontier. Lessonslearned in space also have had implications for some very earthbound problems.

Technology that allowed images to be transmitted over wires was being developed in the 1920s. In 1932 the heart of the TV, the electron scanning tube was patented under the name of an iconoscope. Since that time TV has transformed how much and how quickly we see the world, and – more than radio or motion pictures – how we spend our leisure time.

Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity was another great 20th century breakthrough. It provides deep insights into the nature of gravity as well asthe world’sunderstandingofitself. For the firsttime, hiswork proved that space can be curved and that time could differ from point to point. His theory also led to the conclusionthat all the galaxies, and the whole Universe had originated in the Big Bang, thousands of millions of years in the past. And so the modern science of cosmology was born. By describing how light moves, Einstein created principles that led us to lasers and transistors. And his suggestions, via his special theory of relativity, that a little mass of matter couldcreatetremendousenergyledto the atomicbombandthenuclear age. It is often claimed that no breakthrough has shown more negative and positive potential.

American astronomer Edwin Hubble showed that the universe is expanding. Hubble made his great discoveries on the best telescope in the world at that time - the 100-inch telescope on Mount Wilson in southern California. Today his name’s carried by the best telescope we have, not on Earth, but a satellite observatory orbiting our planet. The Hubble Space Telescope is continuing the work begun by Hubble himself to map our Universe, and producing the most remarkable images of distant galaxies ever seen.

Three American physicists received the 1956 Physics Nobel Prize for their joint invention of a transistor. Transistors played a key role in the advancement of electronics. Today’s computer microchips are essentially tens or even hundreds of millions of transistors and derivative devices on a single wafer* of silicon. Without transistors, we wouldn’t have personal computers, cell phones, fax machines, modems or most other modern electronic devices.

(Adapted from the Internet sites)

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a wafer of silicon – здесь тех., кремневая плата, подложка.

What do you think?

Compare the lists of the breakthroughs you have made with that of the author’s.

Do you agree with the author’s choice of the most significant discoveries and inventions? Why?/Why not?

Do youthink that scientific and technological achievementshave really made the world a better place to live? Give reasons for your opinion.

Focus on language

Read the sentence from the text and decide what parts of speech the words in bold are.

Thefirst entirelysyntheticplastic, Bakelite,was inventedbyAmerican chemist Leo Baekeland in 1909.

Practice

1.Look back in the text and find the words with the suffixes given above. What part of speech are these words?

2.Using the suffixes from the box make different parts of speech with the words below. Make up the sentences ofyour ownwiththe derived words.

Speaking

Every discovery or invention has its downside. Work in teams. Choose one of the discoveriesor inventions and write down two or more negative effects you can think of. Back up your opinion with real life examples. Share your ideas with the class.

Example: “I believe that invention of TV was one of the most important breakthroughs of the last century. However, I often find myself just glued to TV, not wanting to do anything else but watching my favorite reality shows or comedies. It’s such a waste of time … I wish I would spend more time reading books or going out with my friends, or …”

Writing

‘For’ and ‘Against’

1.Work in pairs. Think of the arguments in favor of or against the statement: “Scientific and technological achievements have made the world a better place to live.”

2. Make brief notes under ‘for’ and ‘against’ headings.

Example:

3.Write a composition of 200–250 words discussing the statement above. Make use of the Managing your learning and the Tool boxes.

Managing your learning: Outline Introduction

Paragraph 1 – Introduce the subject of the composition. State why it is an important issue at the present time.

Main body

Paragraph 2 – Givetheargument infavorof thestatement. Paragraph 3 – Give the argument against the statement

Conclusion

Paragraph 4 –Conclude bygiving awell-balancedopinion.

Listening

1.You are going to listen to the radio programme about the Nobel Prize discoveries. Work in groups. Make a list of the facts you know about the Nobel Prize. Discuss as a class.

2.Check if you know these words and phrases. Which field(s) of science

3. Listen to the introductory part ofthe programme and answer the questions.

a)When and where are the Nobel Prizes awarded? Why?

b)What areas of science are they given in?

c)How was the Prize established?

d)How much is it?

e)What does it include?

f)What are the requirements to the Nobel Prize nominees?

g)How are scientists nominated for the Prize?

h)How many inventions did Alfred Nobel hold legal rights to?

i)What is his most famous invention?

4.Listen to the rest of the programme and complete the chart. area of science

winners

country

period of time

research

significance

5. Writedownthe phrasesandwords withthenounprize as you hear them.

prize

6.Sum up the information about the prize-winning research you listened about. Use the phrases in the Tool box.