B1 Preliminary Parte 3: comprensión de un texto largo

Segundo modelo de Reading de B1 Preliminary para descargar: texto largo con preguntas de comprensión, actitud y vocabulario.

B1 Preliminary · Examen 13

Segundo modelo de Reading de B1 Preliminary: un texto largo con preguntas de comprensión y de vocabulario en contexto.

Preguntas originales de Practive English, escritas con el formato oficial de Cambridge. No son preguntas de exámenes reales.

The library that lends more than books

In a small town in northern Spain, the public library started an unusual service five years ago. Alongside novels and textbooks, residents can now borrow drills, sewing machines, camping tents and even musical instruments. The idea came from the librarian, Marta Ruiz, who noticed that many people bought expensive tools, used them once and then left them in a cupboard for years.

At first, the town council was doubtful. What if items were damaged or never returned? In practice, that has rarely happened. Borrowers must be library members and can keep an object for two weeks. Fewer than two per cent of items have been lost, a figure lower than for books.

The service has had unexpected effects. Neighbours who had never spoken now meet at the collection desk and swap advice about repairs. A group of borrowers has started a monthly workshop where they teach each other to fix things. Marta says the tools were only ever the excuse. What the town really needed, she believes, was a reason to talk to one another.

Ejercicio 1 · Preguntas de comprensión

Elige la opción correcta.

  1. What gave Marta the idea for the service?People bought tools and hardly used them.The library had too few books.The council asked for a new service.People bought tools and hardly used them. Está en el primer párrafo: los compraban, los usaban una vez y los guardaban.
  2. What was the council worried about?That the library would become too popular.That objects would be damaged or lost.That the service would cost too much.Damaged or never returned. Es literalmente la duda que expresa el texto.
  3. What does the text say about lost items?More are lost than books.The same number as books.Fewer are lost than books.Fewer than books. «A figure lower than for books».
  4. What does Marta think the town really needed?A reason to talk to each other.More tools.A bigger library.A reason to talk to one another. Última frase del texto.
  5. In the text, swap (paragraph 3) means…sellexchangewrite downExchange. Intercambiar consejos.
  6. What is the writer attitude to the service?Critical.Uninterested.Positive but factual.Positive but factual. Da datos y no exagera: en preguntas de actitud, la respuesta rara vez es un extremo.

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Ejercicio 2 · La mujer que cuenta vencejos

Lee el texto y elige la respuesta correcta.

The woman who counts swifts

Every May, Margaret Ellis climbs onto the flat roof of her building in the old part of town with a folding chair, a notebook and a pair of binoculars she bought in 1994. She is there to count swifts, the small dark birds that arrive from Africa and spend the summer screaming around the rooftops.

She began almost by accident. A neighbour complained that the birds were noisy and wanted the holes under the roof tiles blocked. Margaret, who had never shown much interest in birds, decided to find out how many were actually nesting there before anyone did anything. The answer, that first summer, was eleven pairs.

Twenty-two years later she has counted every season but one, when she was in hospital. Her notebooks are now used by a university team studying how city birds cope with rising temperatures. What makes them valuable is not that they are clever, she says, but that they are boring: the same roof, the same weeks, the same hours, year after year.

The numbers have fallen. There are four pairs now, and Margaret is careful not to blame anyone in particular. Old buildings get repaired, holes get filled, and nobody means any harm. What worries her more is that when she stops, there is no one ready to take the chair up to the roof.

  1. ¿Por qué empezó Margaret a contar vencejos?Para saber cuántos había antes de que taparan los huecos.Porque siempre le habían gustado los pájaros.Porque se lo pidió una universidad.Antes de que taparan los huecos. El texto dice que nunca había mostrado interés por los pájaros.
  2. ¿Cuántas temporadas ha perdido?Ninguna.Una.Dos.Una. Every season but one = todas menos una.
  3. Según Margaret, ¿qué hace valiosos sus cuadernos?Que usa buen material.Que anota muchas especies.Que siempre repite las mismas condiciones.La repetición. Ella misma dice que son valiosos por aburridos.
  4. ¿A quién culpa de la bajada de vencejos?A nadie en concreto.A su vecino.Al ayuntamiento.A nadie. Careful not to blame anyone in particular.
  5. ¿Qué le preocupa más ahora?Que le quiten la azotea.Que nadie continúe el recuento cuando ella lo deje.Que se rompan los prismáticos.Que nadie continúe. Es la idea del último párrafo.
  6. ¿Qué actitud muestra el texto hacia Margaret?Pena por su soledad.Crítica por su obsesión.Respeto por su constancia.Respeto por la constancia. El texto subraya el valor de repetir lo mismo durante años.

Ejercicio 3 · Por qué la tienda se mudó arriba

Lee el texto y elige la respuesta correcta.

Why the shop moved upstairs

For thirty years the bookshop occupied the ground floor of a corner building, with two big windows facing the square. Last autumn the owner, Bilal Haddad, moved the whole shop to the first floor and rented the ground floor to a bakery.

People assumed the shop was in trouble. In fact, Bilal explains, the opposite was true: the ground floor had become too expensive to justify, and he had noticed that most of his customers no longer arrived by chance. They came because they had read something online, or because a friend had told them about a particular book. Passing traffic, the thing shop windows are for, had stopped mattering.

The move was not easy. Some older customers stopped coming because of the stairs, which Bilal admits he did not think about enough. He installed a bell by the street door and offers to bring books down, but he knows that is not the same thing.

Upstairs there is more room, and the rent from the bakery pays for the lift he hopes to install next year. Sales have risen slightly. What Bilal misses, he says, is looking up and seeing someone stop in front of the window with an umbrella, deciding whether to come in.

  1. ¿Por qué se mudó la librería al primer piso?La planta baja salía demasiado cara para lo que aportaba.El negocio iba mal.El edificio se iba a derribar.Demasiado cara. El texto dice expresamente que no iba mal.
  2. ¿Qué había cambiado en sus clientes?Compraban menos libros.Ya no entraban por casualidad al pasar.Eran todos más jóvenes.Ya no entraban por casualidad. Llegaban informados.
  3. ¿Qué problema no previó Bilal?El ruido de la panadería.La falta de espacio.Las escaleras.Las escaleras. He did not think about enough.
  4. ¿Qué hace por los clientes que no suben?Les baja los libros si llaman al timbre.Les manda los libros gratis.Nada, de momento.Se los baja. Aunque él reconoce que no es lo mismo.
  5. ¿Para qué usa el alquiler de la panadería?Para comprar más libros.Para pagar un ascensor.Para bajar los precios.Para el ascensor. Espera instalarlo el año que viene.
  6. ¿Qué echa de menos?La antigua caja registradora.A sus vecinos de la plaza.Ver a alguien pararse ante el escaparate.El escaparate. Es la imagen con la que cierra el texto.