The English Language Quiz

1. How many words do you think there are in the English language?

a) 70,000 b) 170,000 c) 500,000 d) 2 million+

2. The following English words come from other languages. Can you guess which language they are borrowed from?

a) Tea b) Coffee c) Casserole d) Potato e) Shampoo

3. The majority of English words fall into a small number of types of words. These are called word classes. Name the word classes in this table. The first one has been done for you.

TYPE OF WORD	WORD CLASS	EXAMPLE
1. A word which names	1) noun	petal
2. A word which describes	2)	pretty
3. A word which describes an action	3)	push
4. A word which adds information about verbs	4)	smoothly
5. A word which connects parts of speech	5)	and
6. A word which replaces a noun	6)	I
7. A word which indicates relationships	7)	before
8. Words which can be used before all common nouns	8)	the

4. The American English word 'zucchini' means what in Standard British English?

a) beet b) courgette c) radish d) spring onion e) garlic

5. After the Battle of Hastings in 1066 what language was spoken by the Royal Court and the ruling class?

a) Latin b) German c) English d) French e) Swedish

6. Approximately how many languages are spoken in the world?

a) 1070 b) 1250 c) 2100 d) 2700 e) 3200

7. What percentage of the Internet is in English?

a) 55% b) 69% c) 86% d) 92% e) 95%

8. According to the U.S. Census, how many languages are spoken in the United States?

a) 457 b) 329 c) 275 d) 203 e) 162

UNIT 3

What's your brain power?

Try to solve these problems with a partner.

1. How many squares do you see?

2. When my mother was 41 years old, I was 9. Now she is twice as old as I am. How old am I?

3. How can you make four 9's equal 100?

4. Can you make eight 8's equal 1000?

5. You go to bed at 8 o clock in the evening and set the alarm to get up at 9 in the morning. How many hours of sleep would this allow you?

6. One month has 28 days. Of the remaining 11 months, how many have 30 days?

7. Why can't a man living in New York, N.Y. be buried west of the Mississippi?

8. If you stand on a hard marble ftoor how can you drop a raw egg five feet without breaking its shell?

9. Two fathers and two sons shot three deer. Yet each took home one deer. How was that possible?

10. How many times can you subtract the numeral 2 from the numeral 24?

11. A farmer has 4 7/9 haystacks in one comer of the field and 5 2/9 haystacks in another corner of his field. If he puts them all together, how many haystacks will he have?

12. You won a pize in a contest and could choose either a truckload of nickels or half a trucktoad of dimes. Which would you choose? (Both trucks are identical in size and shape.)

13. You are sitting in a room with 12 friends. Can any of them seat themselves in any particular place in this room where it would be impossible for you to do so?

14. After a woman was blindfolded, a man hung up her hat. She walked 50 feet, turned around, and shot a bullet through her hat. How was she able to do this?

nickel: coin of the U.S. and Canada worth 5 cents

dime: coin of the U.S. and Canada worth 10 cents, smaller in size than a nickel

UNIT 4

The questions below are all taken from the different IQ tests and each is aimed at examining one of the 7 basic skills (to find out what these basic skills are you need to look through the text Parts of an IQ Test below). First, try to find the solutions and then define which skill is being examined in each case.

1. Which of the figures, you think best fits the series below?

A.

B.

C.

D.

2. If NEW YORK can be encrypted as PGYAQTM, how can you code the word CHARLOTTE?

A. EICSNPVVG

B. EJCTNQVVG

C. EICTNPVVF

D. EJCSMPVVG

3. The day after the day after tomorrow is four days before Monday. What day is it today?

A. Monday

B. Tuesday

C. Wednesday

D. Thursday

E. Friday

4. Forest is to tree as tree is to?

A. plant

B. leaf

C. branch

D. mangrove

5. Rearrange the following letters to make a word and choose the category in which it fits. "FADLOFDI"

A. city

B. fruit

C. flower

D. vegetable

6. Identify the pair, one word from each group, that is closest in meaning (match the column)

Group A Group B crude top light raw stairs ignite

A.crude and raw B.crude and top C.light and ignite D.stairs and top E.light and raw

7. If 10 people can do a piece of work in 5 days, working 2 hours a day, how long will 2 people take to do the same work, working 5 hours a day?

A. 8

B. 5

C. 10

D. 12

8. Which number should come next in this series? 10, 17, 26, 37,?

A. 46

B. 52

C. 50

D. 56

9. Pick out the odd diagram?

10. Select the figure that is missing from the collection below:

A.

B.

C.

D.

11. Choose the odd one out.

A.

B.

C.

D.

E.

UNIT 5

A famous puzzler's logic

Lewis Carroll, the author of the famous children's book, "Alice in Wonderland", earned his living as a lecturer in mathematics at Oxford, and was also extremely interested in puzzles. The ones that follow are taken from his book "Symbolic Logic".

Draw conclusions from the statements made. Write down the answers. Make sure you have written a proper sentence.

A

1. Babies are illogical;

2. Nobody is despised who can manage a crocodile;

3. Illogical persons are despised.

В

1. My saucepans are the only things I have that are made of tin;

2. I find all your presents useful;

3. None of my saucepans is of the slightest use.

C

1. No potatoes of mine, that are new, have been boiled;

2. All my potatoes in this dish are fit to eat;

3. No unboiled potatoes in this dish are fit to eat.

D

1. Everyone who is sane can do logic;

2. No lunatics are fit to serve on a jury;

3. None of your sons can do logic.

E

1. No experienced person is incompetent;

2. Jenkins is always blundering;

3. No competent person is always blundering.

F

1. No one takes in The Times unless he is well-educated;

2. No hedge-hogs can read;

3. Those who cannot read are not well-educated.

G

1. All puddings are nice;

2. This dish is a pudding;

3. No nice things are wholesome.

H

1. All the old articles in this cupboard are cracked;

2. No jug in this cupboard is new;

3. Nothing in this cupboard, that is cracked, will hold water.

blundering: making clumsy mistakes

wholesome: good for you

UNIT 6

PURE LOGIC

By now you should be able to answer this quiz easily! Work with a partner. Do you know any similar problems of logic? If so, write them down and try them out on a partner.

1. In a certain African village there live 800 women. Three per cent of them are wearing one earring. Of the other 97 per cent, half are wearing two earrings, half are wearing none. How many earrings altogether are being worn by the women?

2. A logician with some time to kill in a small town decided to have his hair cut. The town only had two barbers, each with his own shop. The logician glanced into one shop and saw that it was extremely untidy. The barber needed a shave, his clothes were unkempt, his hair was badly cut. The other shop was extremely neat. The barber was freshly shaved and spotlessly dressed, his hair neatly trimmed. The logician returned to the first shop for his haircut. Why?

3. A secretary types four letters to four people and addresses the four envelopes. If she inserts the letters at random, each in a different envelope, what is the probability that exactly three letters will go into the right envelopes?

4. If you took three apples from a basket that held 13 apples, how many apples would you have?

5. If nine thousand, nine hundred and nine pounds is written as £9,909, how should twelve thousand, twelve hundred and twelve pounds be written?

6. A chemist discovered that a certain chemical reaction took 80 minutes when he wore a tweed jacket. When he was not wearing the jacket, the same reaction always took an hour and 20 minutes. Explain.

7. A customer in a restaurant found a dead fly in his coffee. He sent the waiter back for a fresh cup. After a sip he shouted, "This is the same cup of coffee I had before!" How did he know?

8. "I guarantee," said the pet-shop salesman, "that this parrot will repeat every word it hears." A customer bought the parrot but found it would not speak a single word. Nevertheless, the salesman told the truth. Can you explain?

UNIT 7

Number & Math Play