8.The British Isles

The British Isles consist of two main islands: Great Britain and Ireland. These and over five thousand small islands are known collectively as the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Great Britain contain Ireland, Wales and Scotland. The southern part of the isle of Ireland is the Irish Republic.

The seas round the British Isles are shallow.

On the north-west the coasts are broken by high rocky cliffs. Western Scotland is fringed by the large island chain known as the Hebrides, and to the north east of the Scottish mainland are the Orkney and Shetland Islands.

In Scotland you have three distinct regions. There is, firstly, the Highlands, then there is the central plain or Lowlands. Finally there are the southern uplands, "the Scott country," with their gently rounded hills where the sheep wander.

In England and Wales all the high land is in the west and north-west.

In the north you find the Cheviots separating England from Scotland, the Pennines going down England like a backbone and the Cumbrian mountains of the Lake District. In the west are the Cambrian mountains which occupy the greater part of Wales.

The rivers in Britain are of no great value as waterways – the longest, the Thames, is a little over 200 miles.

In the estuaries of the Thames, Mersey, Tyne, Clyde, Tay, Forth and Bristol Avon are some of the greatest ports.

9. What makes all people kin

People all over the world are very fond of sports and games.

The most popular outdoor winter sports are shooting, hunt­ing, hockey and, in the countries where the weather is much snow — skating, skiing and tobogganing.

Summer affords excellent opportunities for swimming, boating, yachting, cycling, gliding and many other sports. Football takes the first place in public interest. This game is played in all the countries of the world. Badminton is also very popular.

All the year round many people indulge in boxing, wres­tling, athletics, gymnastics and track and field events.

Among indoor games the most popular are billiards, ta­ble tennis, draughts and some others, but the great interna­tional game is chess, of course.

So we may say that sport is one of the things that makes all people kin.

10.Sport in Britain

Sport is very popular in Britain. In other words a lot of British people like the idea of sport, a lot even watch sport, especially on the TV. However, the number who actively take part in sport is probably quite small. On the whole British people prefer to be fat rather than fit

The most popular spectator sport is football. Football is played on a Saturday afternoon in most British towns and the fans, or supporters of a particular team will travel from one end of the country to the other to see their team play,

Many other sports are also played in Britain, including golf in which you try to knock a ball into a hole; croquet in which you try to knock a ball throught some hoops; basket-ball in which you try to get a ball into a net; tennis in which you try to hit a . ball so that your opponent cannot hit it and cricket which is played with a ball, but is otherwise incomprehensible. As you can see, if the ball had not been invented, there would have been no sport.

Actually that's not quite true. Athletics is not played with a ball, nor is horse-racing. Perhaps that explains why they are not so popular as football.

11. Higher education and teacher training in Great Britain

Nowadays teacher training in Great Britain is realized at universities, polytechnics and colleges of higher education. Students working for their first degree at university are called undergraduates. When they take their degree we say that they graduate and then they are called graduates. If they continue studying at university after they have graduated, they are called post-graduates. In general, the first degree of Bachelor is given to students who pass examinations at the end of three or four years of study.

In Britain full-time university students, have three terms of about ten weeks in each year.

University teaching combines lectures given by professors, readers or lecturers, practical classes and small group teaching in seminars or tutorials.

The Programme usually consists of three core components: School-based experience, Subject studies and Education studies.

Theory of Education is one of the main subjects. At the end of the first or second year students are to make their choice as to the age-range of children they wish to prepare to teach.

Junior students go into schools for one day each week, watching experienced teachers at work. They take part in the life of the school, help with games, societies or play productions.

Senior students spend fifteen weeks on teaching practice. They learn the use of different educational aids, audio-visual facilities, observe lessons and take an active part in discussing them with a supervisor (tutor) on school practice.

Examinations are held at the end of each term. Final examinations (or finals) are taken at the end of the course.