Answer key

Unit 8
Reading
Ex 1
1 positive : ability to predict the future has enabled him to collaborate with the world’s leading
clothing manufacturers
2 negative : Don’t let the increasing thickness of magazines fool you, Despite, number of content pages
has plunged, try finding a page without an advertisement first
3 negative : influenced by advertising, unsuspecting, advertisers’ tricky ploys

Ex 2
1 D : unforgettable, leading newspapers
2 C : claim, However, the real reason, to avoid paying for the services of professional actors

Ex 3
1 No, he does not have a good impression of Evie because he thinks she is almost as untidy as her
crumbling house and because he’s trying to avoid looking at her too closely.
2 Yes, Evie realises the man’s real reason because, when she replies, she mentions being cheaper rather
than being quicker.

Ex 4
1 E 3 A
2 H 4 F

Ex 5
1 happy / pleased / excited 4 fun
2 hated / disliked 5 lonely / alone
3 embarrassed

Practice for the exam

Text 1
1 C
2 awe
3 B
4 B
*5 youth culture marketers / marketers
6 A
7 A
*8 want badly / desire
9 D
* 10 No, because it teaches kids to buy things they don’t want and can’t actually play with.

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 Answer key

11 1
* 12 those in the 15–24 age group
13 H
14 F
15 C
16 B
17 G
18 B
* 19 The writer is critical towards marketing companies because (1 mark)
— he calls their strategies ‘a science, though not a pretty one’.
— he says children are ‘the prey’ and calls brand loyalty a ‘battle’.
— he uses words like ‘confusion’, ‘despair’ and ‘desperation’ to describe the effects of successful
marketing on children.
— he feels kids are misled by Pokémon packaging.
— he calls Pokémon cards ‘functionless’. (3 marks for any 3)
20 D
* According to the new HKCEE marking scheme, these types of questions will be marked correct even if
there are grammatical or spelling mistakes as long as the meaning is clear.

Writing
Ex 6
1 C, E
2 F, H
3 A, I

Ex 7
[Suggested answers only]
1 ‘Humans spend a third of their lives sleeping.’ At least, that is what they are supposed to do.
Unfortunately, many children are skipping sleep in order to play computer games and watch
television. As a result, they cannot concentrate at school and their education suffers. In this essay, I
will discuss three ways that the Government can attempt to reverse this problem.
2 Every business, organisation and public body has a web site and now schools are expected to have
them too. Our school is no exception. We must have an attractive and well-designed web site to attract
new students as well as local interest and support. However, the school has no funds to pay for a
professional web designer to produce the web site. In this essay, I will discuss three possible solutions
to the problem.

Ex 8
1 ✗ 3 ✓
2 ✗ 4 ✗

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 Answer key

Ex 9
[Suggested answers only]
1 In conclusion, students would get a chance to contribute to the school magazine if each form could
produce one edition per year. Alternatively, interested students could be divided into groups, each of
which would handle one edition, or each form could produce one section of the magazine which is
then put together as a whole. I believe the best solution is for each form to produce a section as the
magazine would then be more interesting and the students would be able to learn from experience.
2 To summarise, we could publicise a new magazine for teenagers in Hong Kong by giving free copies
of the magazine to schools or by handing them out near schools, making radio and TV
advertisements, and running a competition to win an MP3 player. I think the best solution is to run a
competition to win an MP3 player because a competition will make the magazine more appealing to
new readers.
4 In conclusion, there are a number of ways which we could advertise the school’s Charity Disco. The
three solutions I have discussed are: giving the details to radio stations, newspapers and magazines for
their ‘What’s On’ guides, asking students to place posters in residential and commercial areas and
asking bus companies to put posters in buses that have routes near the school. I believe all three
suggestions should be implemented at the same time.

Practice for the exam

Task 1
B

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 Answer key

Task 1
Model answer

Ex 10
[Suggested answers only]
1 The pros and cons of modern news coverage
2 Advantages Disadvantages
can get news in a way that suits you we have become immune to information
reports are very quick and responsive misinformation can spread easily and quickly
3 d
g
b
f
c
e
a

Ex 11
Paragraph 2 topic sentence: One advantage of modern-day news coverage is that you can get news
whenever, however or wherever you want.
Paragraph 3 topic sentence: A second advantage is that modern media is incredibly quick to respond to
events and news.
Paragraph 5 topic sentence: One disadvantage is that there is so much information that we have become
immune to it.
Paragraph 6 topic sentence: Another disadvantage is that misinformation can spread quickly.

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 Answer key

[Suggested answers only]

Ex 12
1 F, A, D
2 B, E, C

EX 13
[Suggested answers only]
1 The television advertisements give passengers something to focus on while they are travelling. Some
passengers feel very bored and uncomfortable if they do not have something to do or look at on a
journey.
2 Buses are already noisy because of the sound of traffic and engines, and the advertisements raise the
noise level even higher. This disturbs people who wish to read books or magazines, and passengers
have to speak in loud voices if they wish to be heard.
3 Previously, reporters would have relied on the accounts given by the soldiers and the army, which may
have been biased. Embedded reporters could show exactly what happened, even if it was critical of
the army.
4 There was so much detailed information about individual army units and the reporters’ experiences
that no one had the time to put it all into context. Therefore, some analysis of the bigger picture of
the war was lost.

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 Answer key

Practice for the exam

Task 2
Model answer

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