Practice Listening English Exercises for B1 – Amazing science

a blow   b tie   c rub  

d fill   e stir   f cover  

g boil   h pour   i wrap   j shake

1 electrical   2 metal   3 electricity  

4 normal   5 heavier   6 lighter

7 warm   8 cold   9 smaller

Audioscript

A   Man:   Blow air into the balloon and tie the end.

Rub the balloon on your hair or on a tissue.

Put the can on the floor and hold the balloon near it.

Now … Move the balloon away from the can, just pull the balloon slowly along the floor, and the can will move towards the balloon!

How does this work? Well, the can moves towards the balloon because of static electricity. When you rub the balloon, it gets a negative electrical charge. When you put the balloon near the can, the metal in the can gets a small positive electrical charge. The result is that the static electricity in the balloon attracts the can – it pulls the can towards the balloon.

B   Woman:   Fill the glasses with water.

Put two large spoons of salt into the first glass and stir it.

Add a few drops of food colouring into the other glass.

Cover the glass of coloured water with the cardboard or plastic. Turn it upside down and put it on top of the glass of salt water. Pull the cardboard or plastic out from between the glasses. Now … The coloured water and the salty water won’t mix! The two liquids stay apart.

How does this work? Well, salt water is heavier than normal water. Have you ever noticed that your body floats more easily in the sea than in a swimming pool? Try it and you’ll see. In the same way, the heavier salt water stays at the bottom of the glass and the lighter coloured water floats at the top.

C   Man:   Boil the egg for four minutes until the white of the egg is hard but the yolk is soft. The yolk is the yellow part in the middle of an egg. Then peel the egg.

Pour the hot water into the bottle. Put on the lid, wrap it in a towel and shake it well. The bottle will feel very hot, so the towel protects your hands.

Take off the lid and pour out the water.

Put the egg in the opening of the warm bottle.

After a few minutes, the air in the bottle cools and contracts, and the egg is pulled into the bottle.

How does this work? Well, the hot water in the bottle makes the bottle warm, and the air in the bottle gets warm too. Hot air expands – in other words, it gets bigger and fills more space than cold air.  Cold air contracts – in other words it gets smaller and fills less space than warm air. So, as the air in the bottle goes back to room temperature, it gets smaller, and so it pulls the egg into the bottle.

1   He invented a nuclear fusion reactor.

2   1 B   2 B   3 C   4 B   5 A   6 A

Audioscript

Interviewer:   Lauren, you’ve made a documentary about a young man called Taylor Wilson. Tell us about him. Er, how did you find out about him?

Lauren Phillips:   Actually, it was luck. I saw a clip of Taylor Wilson talking and – he inspired me. And his story made me realise that your dreams won’t come true unless you make them come true. We have to work out what we really want to do, and we have to do it.

Interviewer:   Wow! Tell me more!

Lauren Phillips:   Well, as a kid he was really into science. By his early teens, Taylor had enough equipment to carry out simple experiments in his parents’ garage. One time when he was showing a radioactivity experiment to his family, he nearly blew up the whole house! He was lucky, and no one was hurt, though all the neighbours ran out of their homes because they were worried it was a gas explosion!

Interviewer:   Did he get into trouble?

Lauren Phillips:   No, luckily for him, his parents forgave him. In fact after that, they sent him to a special school for super-intelligent kids. Neither his parents nor his school could teach Taylor much by the time he was in his teens. He was just much too clever.

Interviewer:   Uh huh. A lot of very successful adults are the same – they scored in the top one per cent of tests at the age of 12. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Lady Gaga … they all scored in the top one per cent.

Lauren Phillips:   Yes, Taylor scored the same … Anyway, this special school was located next to a university so that school students could use the university’s facilities. Soon Taylor spent all his time hanging out at the university’s nuclear physics department. And that’s when he decided to make a star in a jar.

Interviewer:   ‘A star in a jar’?

Lauren Phillips:   Yes. He worked out how he could build his own nuclear fusion reactor. So the ‘star’ is the burning nuclear reaction and the ‘jar’ is the reactor – the container for the nuclear reaction.

Interviewer:   Uh-huh.

Lauren Phillips:   And then he announced that he was going to build this nuclear reactor at home!

Interviewer:   What?

Lauren Phillips:   Exactly! The nuclear physics teachers were like, ‘Oh, no, that is not a good idea!’, but nothing would stop Taylor, so they helped him to move his nuclear reactor to their laboratory at the university. And at the age of 14, Taylor Wilson became the 42nd person on earth to create their own nuclear fusion reaction.

Interviewer:   That’s incredible.

Lauren Phillips:   I know! Next, he had an idea for using radiation to find hidden guns or bombs. He helped the US Government to make a bomb-detection machine to use at airports. He was even asked to show it to President Obama!

Interviewer:   What is this guy gonna do next?

Lauren Phillips:   I don’t know, but I hope he continues to give lectures like the one I saw. He makes you realise that if you have an idea, you need to act on it now. He’s an amazing speaker and he really gets people excited about science. His lectures have had four million views and there are plans for a Hollywood movie about him!

1 A   2 C   3 C   4 B   5 C   6 A

Audioscript

Interviewer:   Today we’re talking to Anna Millward, who is an expert on fish. Welcome, Anna. How did you first become interested in fish?

Anna:   Well, my mum often took me to the zoo, and I probably saw fish there – I’m not sure. One thing I remember, though, is that when I was eight, I persuaded my teacher to get some fish in a tank for our classroom. The idea came from a novel I had – the main characters were fish, and I think that’s where my love for them started.

Interviewer:   Did you ever want to be a vet?

Anna:   Yes. I actually started a course to become one. It was a long course – six years – but I only completed two of them before I switched to biology. It wasn’t that I didn’t care about animals that were ill – I just wanted to focus on other things, like why are there so many different animals? And how’s one fish different from another?

Interviewer:   Are you mainly a researcher now?

Anna:   Yes, though I also teach. Right now, I’m collecting information about the lakes that are home to a particular type of fish. Most of my research is about that sort of thing. This fish is one that I discovered two years ago – scientists didn’t even know it existed. Hopefully, by studying these fish, we’ll be in a better position to protect them.

Interviewer:   I imagine your work can be difficult sometimes.

Anna:   I love my work. I’ve looked for fish in the freezing waters of northern Russia and in Australian rivers where huge crocodiles live. I deal with all sorts of people – scientists, students, fishermen – with different cultures and languages. And I spend months on end studying fish in a laboratory. I find that part of my work more challenging than anything else – it requires great concentration.

Interviewer:   What do you talk to fishermen about?

Anna:   They often know more than anyone else about the fish in the waters where they work, and I learn a lot from them. They’ll often tell me where I can find a particular type of fish, and they know all about the numbers of fish in a particular area and how they’re getting smaller – they’re directly affected by it.

Interviewer:   Finally Anna – do you eat fish?

Anna:   Yes. I like it and it’s good for me. But I don’t buy fish that’s imported from faraway countries – I choose fish that comes from local waters, and I think it’s important that everyone does that. The biggest problems for fish populations are caused by huge businesses which catch enormous numbers of fish and sell them all over the world.

1   1 Justin   2 Melissa   3 Laura   4 David

2   1 Laura   2 Justin   3 David   4 Melissa

Audioscript

Melissa:   I’ve had some problems with bullies because I’m different. I like wearing unusual clothes, so some people make fun of me. Two months ago, a group of popular girls found out my phone number and started sending me nasty messages. Some days, I got more than 20! Finally, I talked to my parents and that helped! They bought me a new phone and now only my friends have the number. I also block any calls from strangers.

Justin:   Have I ever been cyberbullied? Yes, I have! Last year, I got into a fight with this boy at school, and he got really angry about it. He started writing about me on a social network that all my friends use. He posted comments on my profile, calling me names, and he sent me private messages, saying, ‘I’m going to get you’ and things like that. I never answered him, and I changed the privacy settings on my profile, so only my friends could post comments or send me messages. I’m lucky, because that was the end of the problem.

Laura:   I had a bad time last year because a boy started saying nasty things about me at school. He also sent emails about me to other people. It was bad, and some people stopped talking to me. After a month or so, he finally stopped, and now things are back to normal, but it was difficult for a while. I didn’t tell my parents, but I think that was a mistake. If it happens again, I’ll tell them right away.

David:   I don’t think I’ve been cyberbullied, but I’ve had problems with the internet. I started getting lots and lots of junk mail and other emails from strangers, and lots of adverts from websites all over the world. In the end, I closed that email account and opened a new one, but then the same thing happened again, and again, and again! I’ve changed my email account five times now, and I tell my friends to keep it secret, but the same keeps happening. I don’t know what to do! Maybe someone is putting my email on a public website. I don’t know.