IBTIL TOEFL iBT💎

TOEFL iBT November 30, 2105- Speaking Question 4 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT In the lecture, the professor introduces facial expression feedback which means our physical facial expression displays can directly impact our emotional feelings. He offers an example to illustrate it. He gave two groups of students the same task, that is, to solve some mathematical problems under different instructions. He asked the first group of students to keep smiling during the process and the second group of students to make frowning or unhappy faces while solving the problems. Later on, the first group of students claimed that they were happy while doing the math problems while the second group of students seemed to have much less fun. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 30, 2105- Speaking Question 3 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The university is planning to provide three seminars for freshmen due to two reasons. The first reason is that this can prepare the freshmen for academic challenges and living independently. And the second reason is because the get-together after the seminar can offer a great platform for students to meet and get to know each other. In the conversation, the man agrees with the plan. His first reason is that students will be better prepared academically since unlike high school teachers, college professors don’t usually tell students what to do with their time, they expect students to manage their own time. A seminar like this can teach students what to do and help them plan ahead. As for the second reason, the man points out that this can also help students socially. Students get to hang out together, and they get to make new friends with people who have something in common with them. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 30, 2105- Speaking Question 2 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Which one do you think is more important? The process of doing something or the result at the end? @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 30, 2105- Speaking Question 1 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Which one of the following qualities do you think a good school should have; students who like to help each other, knowledgeable teachers or strict rules? @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

Word of the Day: OBLIGATORY (uh-BLIG-uh-tor-ee) Required, necessary, binding, mandatory. Obligatory duties are those you must perform to fulfill an obligation or responsibility. Doing miscellaneous paperwork is an obligatory function of the clerical worker. Do not pronounce the initial o in obligatory like the o in open. Pronounce it like the a in above.

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 6 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT In the lecture, the professor talks about two production costs that will affect the price of the products. The first one is delivery fee. For instance, if a car company has to deliver the cars to a location which is much closer to where the consumers are, that means they'll have to spend money on delivery, and that eventually will raise the price of the car. The second one is advertising fee. Companies need to spend money on publicity to make their products known to the public. For example, they advertise in magazine and on TV. And of course that costs money too. So it will increase the cost of production eventually as well. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 5 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The man's problem is that he accidentally left his guitar back home, but he's got a concert in a couple of days he has to practice for. There are two possible solutions. The first one is to go back home and retrieve the guitar. And the second solution is to borrow his roommate's guitar. If I were in his shoes, I'd go for the second solution because I'm pretty sure his roommate would be glad to help him out, plus he still has some time to get familiar with his roommate's guitar. I personally don't recommend the other solution because it's too far and it means he has to use the time he's supposed to spend studying on the road. That's why in this case, I think the second solution is a much better option. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 4 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT In the lecture, the professor talks about vertical migration which means sometimes marine animals move up and down the ocean to protect themselves from predators and look for food supply. He offers us an example to illustrate it. There's this kind of fish. They swim to the surface of the ocean at night to feed on a type of organism. They choose to swim to the surface of the ocean at this time of day because it's dark at night and it's almost impossible for the predators to locate them. But during the day, this kind of fish swim back to the bottom of the ocean to avoid predators. This means they have to travel between the bottom and the surface of the sea, but this way they get to survive. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 3 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The university is planning to make two changes to the summer course. The first change is to shorten the course from 8 weeks to 4 weeks. The second one is to reduce on-campus housing fee for students. In the listening, the man thinks it's a great idea. He mentions in his first reason that a lot of students didn't want to take the course because they wanted to spend time with their family or go traveling. Now that the course is shorter they can enjoy their vacation while not missing out on the course. The man took the summer course and he had a whole week before the course started to enjoy his vacation. As for the second reason, he points out that this way students get to save some money which is definitely a good thing for those with a limited budget. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 2 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Do you think scientists should be required to study certain fields or to study whatever that interests them? @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015: Speaking Question 1 @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Your friend is going to a new school to study, what suggestions would you give him to help him blend in. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT

Reading Passage: Make sure you look up the new words! Big Bang @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological model for the early development of the universe. According to the theory, the Big Bang occurred approximately 13.82 billion years ago, which is thus considered the age of the universe. At this time, the universe was in an extremely hot and dense state and was expanding rapidly. After the initial expansion, the universe cooled sufficiently to allow the formation of subatomic particles, including protons, neutrons, and electrons. Though simple atomic nuclei formed within the first three minutes after the Big Bang, thousands of years passed before the first electrically neutral atoms formed. The majority of atoms that were produced by the Big Bang are hydrogen, along with helium and traces of lithium. Giant clouds of these primordial elements later coalesced through gravity to form stars and galaxies, and the heavier elements were synthesized either within stars or during supernovae. The steady state universe theory @aalaeeTOEFLiBT In cosmology, the Steady State theory is a now-obsolete theory and model alternative to the Big Bang theory of the universe's origin (the standard cosmological model). In steady state views, new matter is continuously created as the universe expands, thus adhering to the perfect cosmological principle.

Reading Passage: Make sure you look up the new words! @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The Fall of the Western Roman Empire was the period of decline in the Western Roman Empire in which it disintegrated and split into numerous successor states. By 476 AD, when Odoacer deposed the Emperor Romulus, the Western Roman Empire wielded negligible military, political, or financial power and had no effective control over the scattered Western domains that could still be described as Roman. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Invading "barbarians" had established their own polities on most of the area of the Western Empire. While its legitimacy lasted for centuries longer and its cultural influence remains today, the Western Empire never had the strength to rise again. In 376 AD, large numbers of Goths crossed the Danube River. They sought admission to the territory of the Roman Empire, a political institution which, despite both new and longstanding systematic weaknesses, wielded effective power across the lands surrounding the Mediterranean and beyond. The Empire had large numbers of trained, supplied, and disciplined soldiers, it had a comprehensive civil administration based in thriving cities with effective control over public finances. Among its literate elite it had ideological legitimacy as the only worthwhile form of civilization and a cultural unity based on comprehensive familiarity with Greek and Roman literature and rhetoric. The Empire's power allowed it to maintain extreme differences of wealth and status (including slavery on a large scale} and its wide-ranging trade networks permitted even modest households to use goods made by professionals a long way away. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The events of the decline became the subject of debate at the time, which often took on a strongly religious flavor. Like the events surrounding the fall of the Roman Republic, much of this period is unusually well-documented, though there are very few statistics which directly describe the strength of the economy, army, civil administration, or 'barbarians". Modern historians nevertheless debate the relative importance of these and other factors, in particular, whether the state was significantly weaker by 376 than it had been in previous centuries, and why the West collapsed while the East did not. The collapse, and the repeated attempts to reverse it, are major subjects of the historiography of the ancient world and they inform much modern discourse on state failure.

Word of the Day: BLATANT (BLAYT-’nt) Noisy, disagreeably or offensively loud, boisterous, clamorous: “the blatant sound of horns honking in heavy traffic.” Blatant is also used to mean sticking out in a glaring way, obtrusive, flagrant, as in “a blatant lie,” “a blatant error,” “a blatant attempt to impress the boss.” In either sense, blatant suggests something conspicuous and disagreeable.

TOEFL iBT November 28, 2015 Writing Topic: @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Is it more important for the government to spend money on art and music museums than on facilities like playgrounds, public swimming pool?

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Reading Passage: Make sure you look up the new words! @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Wegener and his predecessors The hypothesis that the continents had once formed a single landmass before breaking apart and drifting to their present locations was first presented by Alfred Wegener to the German Geological Society on 6 January 1912.Although Wegener's theory was formed independently and was more complete than those of his predecessors, Wegener later credited a number of past authors with similar ideas: Franklin Coxworthy (between 1848 and 1890), Roberto Mantovani (between 1889 and 1909), William Henry Pickering (1907) and Frank Bursley Taylor (1908). Evidence that continents 'drift' Evidence for the movement of continents on tectonic plates is now extensive. Similar plant and animal fossils are found around different continent shores, suggesting that they were once joined. The fossils of Mesosaurus, a freshwater reptile rather like a small crocodile, found both in Brazil and South Africa, are one example; another is the discovery of fossils of the land reptile Lystrosaurus from rocks of the same age from locations in South America, Africa, and Antarctica. There is also living evidence-the same animals being found on two continents. Some earthworm families (e.g.: Ocnerodrilidae, Acanthodrilidae, Octochaetidae) are found in South America and Africa, for instance. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT The complementary arrangement of the facing sides of South America and Africa is obvious, but is a temporary coincidence. In millions of years, slab pull and ridge-push, and other forces of tectonophysics will further separate and rotate those two continents. It was this temporary feature which inspired Wegener to study what he defined as continental drift, although he did not live to see his hypothesis become generally accepted. @aalaeeTOEFLiBT Widespread distribution of Permo-Carboniferous glacial sediments in South America, Africa, Madagascar, Arabia, India, Antarctica and Australia was one of the major pieces of evidence for the theory of continental drift. The continuity of glaciers, inferred from oriented glacial striations and deposits called tillites, suggested the existence of the supercontinent of Gondwana, which became a central element of the concept of continental drift. Striations indicated glacial flow away from the equator and toward the poles, in modern coordinates, and supported the idea that the southern continents had previously been in dramatically different locations, as well as contiguous with each other.

Word of the Day: CAPRICIOUS (kuh-PRISH-us) Unpredictable, tending to change abruptly for no apparent or logical reason. Synonyms of capricious include flighty, changeable, impulsive, and fickle. More difficult synonyms include erratic, whimsical (W(H)IM-zi-kul), volatile (VAHL-uh-tul), and mercurial (mur-KYUR-ee-ul). A caprice (kuh-PREES) is a sudden change of mind or change in theemotions. A person or a thing that is capricious is subject to caprices—to abrupt, unpredictable changes: “He's so capricious, his mood changes with the wind”; “New England has a capricious climate”; “The stock market is notoriously capricious.” Did you notice that my recommended pronunciation for capricious is kuh-PRISH-us, the second syllable rhyming with wish? You will hear educated speakers say kuh-PREE-shus, a pronunciation based on the corresponding noun caprice (kuh-PREES). This variant has been recognized by American dictionaries since the 1960s. But authorities have preferred kuh-PRISH-us since the 18th century, when pronunciation was first recorded. Current American dictionaries list kuh-PRISH-us first, and it is the only pronunciation in the Oxford English Dictionary. Have you ever heard anyone put an E in the middle of suspicious, judicious, or avaricious? Rhyme capricious with delicious.