Q1.
Your teacher will read the paragraph given below, listen to the paragraph carefully. Your teacher will ask you some questions, which you can try to answer.
Birds are beautiful creatures with feathers and wings. Due to various reasons, many species of birds have become endangered. To protect these birds and their species, bird sanctuaries have been built. There are more than 70 bird sanctuaries in India. The Vedanthangal Bird Sanctuary, located in Tamil Nadu, is the oldest bird sanctuary in India. The Bharatpur Bird sanctuary, located in Rajasthan, is the largest bird sanctuary in our country.
Answer
How this task works: Your book prints the paragraph, but in class you should close your eyes or look away and only listen while your teacher reads it. Then answer from what you heard. That is the skill being practised here.
- Listen right through once without writing anything.
- Listen a second time. This time, catch the numbers and the names of places — those are what questions are usually asked about.
- Now answer in full sentences.
The facts in the paragraph, and the answers to the questions your teacher is likely to ask:
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| 1. What do birds have that other creatures do not? | Birds are beautiful creatures with feathers and wings. |
| 2. What has happened to many species of birds? | Many species of birds have become endangered, which means they are in danger of dying out completely. |
| 3. What has been built to protect these birds? | Bird sanctuaries have been built to protect the birds and their species. |
| 4. How many bird sanctuaries are there in India? | There are more than 70 bird sanctuaries in India. |
| 5. Which is the oldest bird sanctuary in India, and where is it? | The Vedanthangal Bird Sanctuary is the oldest bird sanctuary in India. It is located in Tamil Nadu. |
| 6. Which is the largest bird sanctuary in our country, and where is it? | The Bharatpur Bird Sanctuary is the largest bird sanctuary in our country. It is located in Rajasthan. |
| 7. Why do we need bird sanctuaries at all? | Because birds are losing their homes and are in danger. A sanctuary is a protected place where they can live and build nests safely, and where nobody is allowed to harm them. |
Two words worth keeping: A species is one particular kind of animal or bird — the house sparrow is one species, the peacock is another. Endangered means so few are left that the whole kind may disappear for ever. A sanctuary is a safe place where they are protected by law.
How to listen well: Do not try to remember every word. Listen for four things — who, what, where and how many. In this paragraph those are: birds · sanctuaries · Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan · more than 70.
Did you know? The Bharatpur sanctuary in Rajasthan is also called Keoladeo National Park. Thousands of birds fly there in winter from far-away cold countries. The Vedanthangal sanctuary in Tamil Nadu is more than 250 years old — the villagers there protected the birds long before there was any law.