Page 134 - Complete_advanced_students_book_with_answers_Neat

The living world
Grammar
/PVOT BOE BSUJDMFT
1 Work in pairs. Find the following in the text below.
two singular countable nouns
three plural countable nouns
three uncountable nouns
two of these three uncountable nouns that could be
countable in other contexts
two proper nouns (names), apart from Baobab
Baobab trees,
which are found
in Africa, are
frequently compared
with elephants because their bark
resembles the skin of an elephant.
They consist of the most bulky,
twisted tissue of any plant on
Earth. The most ancient are
believed to be 1,000 years old.
2 Many words have different meanings depending on
whether they are countable or uncountable. What
is the difference in meaning between these pairs of
sentences?
B I like coffee.
C I’d like a coffee.
B I can’t see – my hair is in my eyes.
C I’ve got a hair in my eye.
B Most English cheese is hard.
C There are more than 1,000 British cheeses.
B Anna lost a lot of weight when she was ill
C Lifting weights strengthens your muscles.
B Car windscreens are made from toughened glass.
C I only wear glasses for reading.
a He has no experience of living in a cold climate.
C But he has read about the experiences of other
people.
B Exercise is good for you.
C We’ve got four exercises to do for homework.
QBHF -BOHVBHF SFGFSFODF Countable and uncountable
nouns
132
3 Circle the correct articles in these extracts from
Reading and Use of English Part 7 (Ø = no article).
Then check your answers by looking back at the text.
A / The last time Irene Pepperberg saw Alex, she said
goodnight as usual.
It took a / the brilliant insight to turn this human-
centricity on its head.
This novel approach came to Dr Pepperberg,
a / Ø theoretical chemist, in 1977.
But Alex, unlike a / Ø chimpanzee, learned to speak
words easily.
Ø / The birds as well as Ø / the mammals can evolve
Ø / a complex and sophisticated cognition.
Dr Pepperberg and her collaborators at a / the
University of Arizona began teaching Alex.
She went to a / Ø pet shop and bought an African Grey
parrot, which was then just a / the year old.
… the capabilities of a species only distantly related to
humanity: a / the parrot.
Thus began one of a / the best-known double acts in
the fi eld of animal-behaviour science.
Researchers in this area live in Ø / a perpetual fear of
the ‘Clever Hans’ effect. This was named after a / the
horse that seemed to be able to count.
4 Now match each use of a/an, the and Ø in Exercise 3
with one of these rules for the use of articles.
Use the defi nite article (the)
B when there is only one of something/someone
C with superlative adjectives and fi rst, last, only, same
D to refer to something/someone that has been
mentioned before or that the reader already knows
about
E to refer to all the members of a group or species.
Use the indefi nite article (a/an)
B to refer to something/someone for the fi rst time
C in place of the number one
D to refer to something/someone which is not specifi c
(i.e. it doesn’t matter which one)
E to refer to someone’s job.
Use no article (Ø)
B with uncountable nouns which refer to something
general
C with plural countable nouns which refer to
something general.
QBHF -BOHVBHF SFGFSFODF Articles