Subjunctive

A webpage on the use of subjunctive is hereby made available.

Phrasal verbs

Here you can find some exercises on phrasal verbs.  The key to the exercises is hereby made available. (Source: English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy)

Noun, adjective and verb + preposition

Here you can find some exercises on nouns, adjectives and verbs which are used with certain prepositions.  The key for the exercises are also hereby made available. (Source: English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy)

Basic prepositions

Here you can find some exercises on basic prepositions.  The key to the exercises is hereby made available. (Source: English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy)

Reported speech

I am hereby providing some documents on reported speech as well as object and subject questions with the key for the exercises from English Grammar in Use: Intermediate by Raymond Murphy.  More  exercises on reported speech along with the key are also made available.

Here you can also find more information on subject, object, verb, tense, time and location modifications in reported speech and indirect speech. (Business Grammar Builder by Paul Emmerson)

Sample listening summary

The Challenges of Population Growth

Professor Hans Rosling introduces his theory on why population growth should be kept under control. After describing the situation between 1960 and 2010 by using boxes in different colours, he makes predictions for 2050.  By then world population will have grown to 9 billion.

In 1960 world population was 3 billion. In the industrialised world there were 1 billion people who were healthy, educated and rich with high child survival rate and small families. Their aspiration was to buy a car. However, in the underdeveloped world of 2 billion people with poor child survival and big families, there was only one aspiration: having food for the day, and if possible, saving enough to buy a pair of shoes. The gap was enormous.

From 1960 to 2010, 4 billion people were added to the world population. The economies in the industrialised world grew, and the people there were aspiring to fly to remote destinations for their holidays.

From 1960 on, the most successful developing countries, the total population of which amounted to 1 billion in 2010, had been receiving better education, hygienic living conditions and medication, while they were aspiring to own a car. The 3 billion people living in the rest of the developing countries had also been getting healthier and better educated, while they were aspiring to buy a bicycle. In 2010 the average number of children per woman in the developing world was two to three due to family planning.

In the meantime, the 2 billion people in underdeveloped countries were still aspiring to have food and shoes. The gap between the richest and the poorest was still big, but there was a continuous world concerning levels of welfare; most people tended to be in the middle.

Rosling then introduces a projection for 2050. If the world invests in the green technology to avoid climate change, and energy becomes cheaper, then emerging economies will indeed become sustainably richer. He predicts the total population in the underdeveloped world, which was 2 billion in 2010, to double. If these people get out of poverty, have better education and improve child survival, then their population increase will stop. As he puts it, "Child survival is the new green." Thus it is possible to have a just world with green technology and global governance. The old West will be the foundation of this new modern world.

Sample synthesis summary

U-bend of life

The two articles deal with  happiness and try to provide answers to the old question of what happiness is correlated to. Both articles are based on happiness measurements conducted by economists or psychologists.

The first and main article examines four main factors, i.e.,  gender, personality, external circumstances and age:

• It seems that women are, by and large, slightly happier than men. However, they former are also more susceptible to depression.
• Concerning personality,  people who are prone to guilt, anger and anxiety tend to be unhappy, unlike extrovert people.
• Some correlations also seem to hold  between external circumstances –  such as relationships, education, income or health – and the way people feel.
• The article mainly focuses on the last factor, i.e., the clear link between age and "self-reported well-being".

The article then details the U-bend graph, which shows that people are least happy at a global average of 46, and it evaluates the possible reasons. This tendency appears all over the world even if the nadir average can vary across countries.

 

In the end, this is rather good news for a world which has to deal with an ageing workforce.

The second article analyses the more specific correlation between money and happiness at country level, and it tries to evaluate to what extent  money can buy happiness. Although richer countries are clearly happier, the correlation is not perfect, which suggests that other factors, presumably cultural ones, are at work.