PRACTICE WITH ANALYZING RESPONSES The list below covers the important features of a well-written response to an integrated writing task. You will not have time to rewrite your response during the test. Therefore, keep this list in mind as you organize the information and write your response. 1. Is there a topic sentence that introduces the main idea of the listening passage? 2. Have all the key points been presented? 3. Is the response well organized? 4, Is the information presented accurately? 5. Is the information presented in your own words? 6, Isall the information found in the passages? 7. Is the response cohesive? 8. Are the sentences written concisely? 9. Is the response completed with a concluding statement? 10. Have grammar and spelling errors been corrected? EXERCISE W42 Scoring responses Read the following six student responses to item 2 in Exercise W40 and give them a score * A score of 5 is for a response that indicates strong writing abilities. * A score of 4 indicates average writing abilities. * A score of 3 indicates minimal writing abilities. * Scores of 2, 1, or 0 indicate a lack of writing abilities. ‘When you are finished, compare the score you gave each response with the score given in the Answer Key. Read the analysis of the responses to understand the given score. 1’ Score _ Animals seem to be able to predict that an earthquake is coming and therefore, can be used as a way to warn people to evacuate a city like Haicheng in China. However, according to the lecture, it was not animals that warned the people of a coming earthquake, The authorities order the city to be evacuated because there were small earthquakes before the big one. ‘Sometimes animals do behavior that isn’t normal, like tish leaping out ot the ‘water and dogs barking all the time. Because animals have better hearing than people, they can hear the movement of the earth before the people. That is why the dogs keep barking. However, according to the lecture, animals don't act any differently. People just notice a behavior that they didn’t noticed before because an earthquake didn’t forced them to notice the strange behavior. 2. Score _ People believe that animals and things like fish and snakes know when an earthquake is going to happen. They do weird things like jump out of the water and if people pay attention to the weird things they do, they would know that an earthquake starting. ‘The lecture say that it is not true that animals can to know that an earthquake happens. People focussing on their pets because of the earthquake remember different things that did not really happen. Stories of animals who run away is the people making up things because they have been upset by the catastrophe. ‘The Chinese City of Haicheng had a 7.3 magnitude quake in 1975 but nobody died because the authorities predict the big quake and told everyone to leave the city.3. Score The notion that animals could be used as an early warning signal to alert people of impending earthquakes is not supported by the proven evidence. ‘Many people believe that because creatures seem to know when an earthquake is going to occur and act strangely or go missing, they can be used as indications that there is danger. Because the animals have senses that are more acute than those of people, they can detect minor movements in the earth or changes in the earth’s magnetic field. However, the evidence that people give is their personal interpretation of an event after the fact. Supposedly, pets run away when they sense a pending earthquake. However, California scientist researched reports of missing pets and did not find any correlation between the number of animals reported to have gone missing immediately before an earthquake and those reported missing during times when there is no seismic activity. People tend to remember events more vividly when suffering trauma caused by something like an earthquake and therefore, may remember their dogs acting differently. However, the dog may have acted that way before, but the pet owner did not notice because an earthquake had not yet occur to fix that behavior in their minds. Even the evidence of the thousands of people being saved by animals in the Chinese earthquake has proved false because some shock waves occurred before the earthquake and this gave the people real warning of an impending disaster. 4. Score__ There is earthquakes animal tell big. Go away and be saved. 5. Score _ Ithas been believed since before the Greek civilization that animals can predict «earthquakes. People report that animals act in strange ways and frequently evacuate an area before the earthquake occurs. They are able to do this because they have senses that are better than humans. According to many people, paying attention to these animal behaviors could be an important way to predict earthquakes and save the lives of thousands of people. However, according to the lecture, itis not true that animals are a reliable way to predict earthquakes. It is true that animals have better senses, but that doesn’t mean they can actually predict earthquakes, The evidence that they can do this is based on people remembering something vividly because something bad happened. But what they remember is probably something that occurs normally that they had never paid attention to before. A scientist in California did a study to see if there is a correlation between dogs running away from home and there occurring an earthquake. He did not find that dogs ran away any more often before an earthquake than at other times during the three year study. Even the famous story of animals saving thousands of people in China in 1975 was disputed in the lecture. Apparently, some tiny earthquakes occurred first and this alerted the authorities to evacuate the city. 6. Score The people believe that animals can tell an earthquake since the ancient Greeks. Animals have ears that can hear the earth move because of ultrasound. Even they know near epicenters. And animals predict an earthquake in China and saving the lives of thousands of people. So animals are good for people.