Grade – 12
English Language
Name: ………………………………………………. Time: 3hrs
1. Write an essay on one of the following topic. (30 marks)
1.Discuss your views of the truly liberated woman or of the truly liberated man.
2.Film for children should be produced more.
3.English: a symbol of modernization and an extra arm for success and mobility.
4.Difficulties Encountered by Sri Lankan Students Studying English Literature.
3. Read the following passage and answer the questions. Give short answers. Next Divide your paper into 5 columns and number the lines, write the précis in approximately 137 words. (30 marks)
Doing a research simply means searching for knowledge, or a way of discovering or developing something or a method that will lead and join people with the advanced world. Research has a very open extent that it includes different areas such as science, life styles, arts, politics, history etc. Different people in different parts of the world can claim completely opposite results on the topic because of the varying examined data or contradictory environment they have. As we are constantly learning more and more one can disagree with the above topic. There are so many things that we couldn’t even begin to imagine and we don’t even aware on that. However through researches we learn and get benefited. But the thing is in this changing world any research won’t be perfect. It will always be better than the previous one.One can argue about it in different ways. For example on one hand the inventions at the past were perfect in terms that we actually used them and benefited from them for so many decades on the other hand those inventions are not perfect because it didn’t actually fulfill all the necessities of humans. Therefore the perfection of invention or research is not the matter, but the endless necessities that human beings have. These endless necessities make the humans do more researches and as a result of that humans always try to find new inventions. As we live in a world where globalization highly exists, people in one part of the world easily have inter- connections with people in another part of the world. So they often exchange ideas and everyday they learn something new that can enhance their knowledge. Then researches only become a continuous process which involves strenuous human power and money.Innovation is a multi-stage process whereby organizations transform ideas into new/improved products, service or processes, in order to advance, compete and differentiate themselves successfully in their marketplace. [Baregheh, 2009, pg 48] It is true the fact that people need to invent different things to fulfill their needs and wants. They always need to boost up their knowledge most of the time for the mean of satisfaction. Subsequently they search and search till they find the best thing but end up with finding a better thing because humans won’t content with what they have and they always believe the fact that there is something ahead better than the things they have. In addition to that the process of inventing something they pay attention for the quality, durability, simplicity and value. This enhances with the competitiveness. Therefore after inventing something they intend to find another alternative that can be more qualitative, more durable and simpler. That is the true nature of invention and that is how an invention or a research becomes a multi-stage process. Moreover that is why humans give birth to various products with considerable changes than the first product. It is clearly evident with the inventions such as abacus, calculator, computer [desktop], laptops, palmtops etc.Although research results may appear promising, nevertheless, their reliability or validity has always been threatened with the presence of errors and biases in the study. [Mehra, 2002, pg125] The word perfect means ideal or complete without any fault or weakness in other words it can mean that 100% correct. But for a research or an invention it is difficult to apply the word perfect as it won’t be 100% correct. Therefore it is correct to agree with the statement of having 'no hope in doing perfect research'. But reach to perfection becomes the aim of doing a research. By nature human beings are imperfect. They always struggle to survive. They don’t think deep before doing anything. So naturally or may be due to unavoidable circumstances they made mistakes. So imperfect human beings never end up a task with a perfect result, but they can end up their tasks by achieving a successful better result.
3. Read the following passage and answer the questions below it using your own words as far as possible. (20 marks)
She served supper and sat listening. There is not one maize plant left, she heard. Not one. The men would get the planters out the moment the locusts were gone. They must start all over again. “But what’s the use of that?” Margret wondered, if the whole farm was going to be crawling with hoppers. But she listened while they discussed the new government pamphlet, which said how to defeat the hoppers. You must have meant all the time moving over the farm to watch for movements in the grass. When you find a patch of hoppers small lively things, like crickets, then you dig trenches around the patch or spray them with poison from pumps supplied by the government. The government wanted them to co-operate in a world plan for eliminating this plague forever. You should attack locusts at the source hoppers in short. The men were talking as if they were planning a war, and Margret listened, amazed.
The night it was quite no sign of the settled armies outside, except sometimes a branch snapped or a tree could be heard crashing down.
Margret slept badly in the bed beside Richard, who was sleeping like a dead, exhausted with the afternoon’s fight. In the morning she woke to yellow sunshine lying across the bed, clear sunshine with an occasional blotch of shadow moving over it. She went to the window. All Stephen was ahead of her. Then she stood outside, gazing down over the bush. And she gazed astounded and entranced, much against her will; for it looked as if every tree, every bush, all the earth was lit with red flames. The locusts were fanning their wings to free them of the night dew. There was a shimmer of red tinged gold light everywhere. She went out to join the old man, stepping carefully among the insects. They stood and watched. Overhead the sky was blue, blue and clear.
“Pretty,” said all Stephen with satisfaction.
“Well” thought Margret, “we may be bankrupt, but not everyone has seen an army of locusts fanning their wings at dawn.”
Questions
From whose viewpoint is the attack of the locusts seen?
What effect is gained by the use of such terms as “defeat”, “armies’ war”, “fight” etc?
What does stepping carefully among the insects suggest?
What contrasting attitudes to the locusts’ invasion are established in the passage?
What contradictory aspects for nature does the passage evoke?
4. Read the poem and then answer the questions which follow.
The following poem by Michael Hartnett was written for his ten year old daughter, Lara.
Poem for Lara, 10
An ash tree on fire,
the hair of your head
coaxing larks
with your sweet voice
in the green grass,
a crowd of daisies
playing with you,
a crowd of rabbits
dancing with you,
the blackbird
with its gold bill
is a jewel for you,
the goldfinch
with its sweetness
is your music.
You are perfume,
you are honey,
a wild strawberry:
even the bees think you
a flower in the field.
Little queen of the land of books,
may you be always thus,
may you ever be free
from sorrow-chains.
Here’s my blessing for you, girl,
it is no petty grace –
1. From the imagery the poet uses, what impression of Lara do you get?
2. What type of person do you think Michael Hartnett was?
3. Do you like or dislike this poem? Give reasons for your answer based on evidence from the poem.
4. What are the themes of the poem?
