English Book

Introduction

Reading Comprehension

Well, without proper comprehension skills, students lack the ability to understand what they read. The point of reading isn’t to make sounds in your brain or out loud, but rather, to understand important lessons, stories and arguments. Through the act of writing, our ancestors have recorded important knowledge that we can understand simply by reading. By understanding what we read, we pick up important information, understand scientific theories, past opinions and new frontiers. (In layman’s terms, it is through reading that we no longer have to ‘discover’ gravity, or the independence of 182 nations with every new generation).

Having excellent reading comprehension skills is crucial. It increases the enjoyment and effectiveness of reading and helps not only academically, but professionally, and in a person’s personal life. Imagine, for example, that your boss gives you a complicated document: you can read the words, but you cannot understand what the document is telling you. What then, is the point of being able to ‘read,’ if it can’t help you move forward?

Before reading the texts, watch this video, it will help you to improve your reading comprehension skill by giving you some tips to make answering the text questions easy.

The first text

Winning at the Olympics

1   The Olympic Games is one of the biggest sporting competitions in the world. Every four years, athletes from all over the world compete to bring home a medal¹. Each country is proud of its Olympic athletes.

2   Israel first competed in the Olympics in 1953, but for many years its athletes didn’t win any medals. This changed at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, when Yael Arad and Oren Smadja both won a medal in judo. Yael won a silver² medal and Oren won a bronze³. When they returned to Israel, everyone was proud of them and wanted to know more about them. Yael and Oren were on television, on the radio, and in the newspapers.

3   Since then, Israeli athletes have won more medals. The Olympics in Athens in the year 2004 was an exciting year for Israeli sports. That year, Gal Fridman won a gold medal in windsurfing. He was the first Israeli sportsman to win an Olympic gold⁴ medal. Fridman said, “I felt the whole country was watching me and pushing from behind.” That evening, when Fridman got his medal, the Israeli national anthem⁵ was sung at the Olympics for the first time.

4          When Israeli athletes succeed in the Olympics, more and more young people want to do sports. For example, Israel has won six medals in judo, and today judo is one of the most popular after-school sports. Israel hopes to win more medals in judo, windsurfing, and other sports at the next Olympics.

The second text

The Real Junk Food Project

1   Every year, supermarkets and other food companies throw away millions of kilograms of food. In the U.K., supermarkets throw away about £230 million (over one billion shekels) of food a year. At the same time, over four million people in the world are suffering because they do not have enough to eat.

2   Chef Adam Smith thought it was wrong that so much food was wasted when so many people were hungry. In 2013, he opened a café in the English city of Leeds. It was called the Real Junk Food Project and it served delicious meals using food that supermarkets were throwing away.

3   This wasn’t the only thing that was different about this café. It was also the first café where customers paid as much money as they wanted for their food. Smith called it
a “pay-as-you-feel” café. Some people paid only two shekels for a bowl of soup, others paid up to 25 shekels, and some paid nothing. Customers could also “pay” by washing dishes at the café or doing work for the café’s website.

4          Soon the idea became more and more popular. Today, the Real Junk Food Project is an organization of more than 125 “pay-as-you-feel” cafés all over the world. In 2016, it opened its first supermarket. Just like the cafés, customers pay as much as they want for the food. The food in the store is food that other supermarkets would have thrown away. The Real Junk Food Project is planning to open a supermarket in every town in Britain.

The third text

How to Survive

1   Do you know how to find food and water in nature¹? Do you know how to deal with dangerous animals? Sarah Marquis, an explorer², has a lot of experience walking alone in nature for months or even years. She has written many popular books about how she does this and survives.

2   In order to survive, Sarah knows that it is important to plan. Before each trip, she studies maps of the area, the food that grows on the ground and on the trees, the weather and the language. It can take her two years to plan a trip.

3   One of Sarah’s most famous trips was a three-year walk from Siberia to Thailand. On the way, she had to deal with both very hot and cold weather. The highest temperature was 51°C and the lowest was -30°C. While she walked, there were many times she had nothing to eat. There were other times when Sarah was so sick that her life was in danger, but she didn’t stop until she finished.

4   On a trip to Australia in 2015, Sarah walked 800 kilometers across the country. For three months, she had no contact with people. Sarah didn’t carry very much food with her, so she ate fish that she caught in the rivers and any other food that she could find. One time, a dangerous bull³ followed her, but she wasn’t afraid. Sarah understood that the big bull was just interested in what she was doing. Because she stayed calm and continued to walk, the bull didn’t chase her and she survived.

5          Sarah is now 45 years old and she has been out in nature half her life. Although these trips often put her in danger, she loves what she does and is already planning her next trip