KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN

DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA

NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024

SỞ GIÁO DỤC VÀ ĐÀO TẠO QUẢNG BÌNH

(Thời gian làm bài 180 phút, không kể thời gian giao đề)
Ngày thi: 12/09/2023

I. LISTENING (50/200 points)

Link audio: https://youtu.be/TkRTLaRRznk
Part 1. For questions 1-5, listen to a talk about the brain and decide whether these statements are
True (T), False (F) or Not Given (NG).
Question Answer

Question 1. Incoordination is a side effect of epilepsy treatment in post-split patients.

Question 2. The speaking brain has no control over the non-speaking brain's vision and
subsequent picking action.

Question 3. Incompatibility in actions demonstrates a new “you” in each individual.

Question 4. Regardless of any confusion from right brain's surprising actions, the speaking
brain will attempt to decipher them.

Question 5. The fact that the two cerebral hemispheres have always coexisted explains their
ability to keep up with each other.
Part 2. For questions 6-10, listen to a piece of news and answer the questions. Write NO MORE
THAN THREE WORDS taken from recording for each answer.
Question 6. What behaviour does orchid mantis display?
→ ______________________________________________________________________.
Question 7. What does Anglerfish use to hunt?
→ _______________________________________________________________________.
Question 8. Which part of our body allows us to acknowledge the mantis?
→ _______________________________________________________________________.
Question 9. What is the unique disguise of orchid mantis regarded as?
→ _______________________________________________________________________.
Question 10. Whose disguise strategies have remained as a mystery to human for a long time?
→ ______________________________________________________________________.
Part 3. You will hear an interview with a woman called Tansy Burton, who runs a company which
makes beauty products. For questions 11-15, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which fits best
according to what you hear.
Question 11: To what does Tansy attribute her success as a businessperson?
A. It was a family tradition
B. It reflects her early training
C. It grew out of a desire to please people.
D. It’s something which came naturally to her
Question 12: What was Tansy’s main role in setting up the production company?
A. drawing up a business plan

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B. attracting sufficient investment
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
C. responding to customer preferences
D. establishing administrative systems NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Question 13: According to Tansy, her fragrances are successful because they _______.
A. are elegantly packaged
B. appeal to a wide range of people
C. suggest an expensive lifestyle
D. reflect changes in consumer taste
Question 14: Increasingly, Tansy sees people’s choice of fragrances as a reflection of the wearer’s
_______.
A. social standing B. taste in other products
C. emotional state D. financial situation
Question 15: In the future, Tansy expects to see _______.
A. a wider use of fragrances in society
B. fewer companies involved in producing fragrances
C. single products fulfilling a range of functions
D. increasing profitability for producers of fragrances
Part 4: You will hear a news programme about a climate change report. For question 16-25, listen
and complete the summary below by writing NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A
NUMBER for each answer. Write your answers in the corresponding numbered boxes on your
answer sheet. (20 points)
During the frying process, the chemical reactions give the food the crispy (16) ________. The
bubble that appears is actually water leaving the ingredient, leading to the next stages. The first stage is
oil uptake, where the surface (17) ________, forming the crispy crust and gaps of (18) ________. The
next stage is called heat transfer. As the outside layer of molecules is heated up thanks to (19)
________, the inside is heated up through conduction. The batter acts as a layer to protect the (20)
________ of the inside and give the dish extra flavour. Adding beer to the batter can be an ideal
choice, since the carbon dioxide in the beer forms bubbles that fluff up the batter and (21) ________.
When frying food, some types of oil are superior to others, bringing different (22) ________, flavour
and having different smoke points. For example, corn oil made up of polyunsaturated fats with weak
(23) ________ boils at lower temperatures. This is because this type of oil generate (24) ________. It
is suggested that we choose oil with high smoke point and apply knowledge about heat transfer and
(25) ________ when cooking.

II. LEXICO-GRAMMAR (25/200 points)

Part 1. For questions 26-45, choose the correct answer A, B, C, or D to each of the following
questions.
Question 26: The city stopped urban _______ by rebuilding neighborhoods.
A. scourge B. rot C. bane D. blight
Question 27: He drove out of Brighton cheerfully enough, munching his sandwich, climbing the
London road until he had _______ the Downs.
A. aped B. breasted C. winged D. capped
Question 28: Amanda was sent on _______ to their offices in Hong Kong.
A. transference B. relocation C. adjustment D. attachment
Question 29: The store will be closed this afternoon due to staffing shortages. _______ adjust.
A. Kindly B. Tenderly C. Delicately D. Tolerantly
Question 30: She leaned forward to watch the _______ children from the window.
A. meddlesome B. peroxisome C. frolicsome D. nettlesome
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Question 31: A robin was _______ on the fence.
A. perching
DỰ THI CHỌNC.HỌC
B. rodding roosting
SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
D. branching
NĂM with
Question 32: Floodlighted, the white marble gleamed HỌC 2023
a snowy - 2024
_______.
A. fluorescence B. incandescence C. phosphorescence D. opalescence
Question 33: Barker was doing what Johnson would call a _______ of honour, circling the room
saying goodbyes.
A. knot B. lap C. round D. ring
Question 34: One end of the channel _______ led to the Gulf, the other to a dead end.
A. fortuitously B. gratuitously C. circuitously D. felicitously
Question 35: After the floods, volunteers _______ with trucks to help the three thousand residents.
A. touched up B. dealt in C. flung off D. pitched in
Question 36: The car was launched with a massive media _______, involving newspapers, magazines,
television and radio.
A. raid B. blitz C. blast D. spree
Question 37: She described the new criminal bill as a _______ attack on democracy.
A. eccentric B. licentious C. lunatic D. perfidious
Question 38: Disney World was like an ordinary amusement park with _______ on.
A. knobs B. boots C. hats D. ties
Question 39: The law has never prevented clever lawyers from finding ways of tax _______ for their
clients.
A. evasion B. avoidance C. exemption D. impunity
Question 40: We have to incorporate new technologies. We can’t afford to be _______ by our
competitors.
A. looked askance B. kept posted C. put paid D. caught napping
Question 41: We can just get a sandwich if you want – that won’t break _______.
A. the mould B. the ice C. the bank D. the means
Question 42: The game will not be disrupted or _______ destroyed by the decision of a player to leave
the game prematurely.
A. fortuitously B. maliciously C. haphazardly D. offhandedly
Question 43: When Mary has an exam to take, she either studies day and night or does nothing at all.
She can never find the _______.
A. a double bind B. a leading light C. the common touch D. the happy medium
Question 44: Still doubtful of the success of the _______ “flying machines”, the writer mused that
“comparatively few of us have any desire to float in the air at a great height from the earth”.
A. bedraggled B. newfangled C. credentialed D. bespectacled
Question 45: Facebook's shares are _______ after the company launched a new Instagram feature that
will compete with TikTok in the US.
A. on a tear B. on high skies C. coming up roses D. holding their thumbs
Part 2. For questions 46-50, write the correct form of each bracketed word in each sentence in the
numbered space provided in the column on the right.
Question 46: Olga was a _______ debater with a caustic tongue in polemics and a nice touch in irony
in writing. (DOUBT)
Question 47: Their performances were _______ with guitar strings snapping - as ever - and the timing
fluctuating erratically. (SHAMBLES)
Question 48: Chicken farmers have strengthened _______ to prevent contamination from people who
have visited live-bird markets. (SECURE)
Question 49: There is no _______ the technical brilliance of his performance. (SAY)

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Question 50: The coronation ceremony was a grand affair, where the new monarch was _______
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
amidst cheers and celebrations. (THRONE)
III. READING (70/200 points) NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Part 1. For questions 51-60, read the following text and fill in the blank with ONE suitable word.
TikTok users in the UK face being (51) ________ with a “less safe” and “more toxic” (52)
________ of the app than those in Europe after the tech (53) ________ was forced to make its
algorithm optional there to (54) ________ with EU rules. From the end of August, TikTok users in 30
countries in the European Economic Area will be able to opt out of receiving (55) ________ content
recommendations, which are largely (56) ________ based on past activity. Instead, their “For You”
and live feeds will include popular videos from the places they live and around the world. This
weekend, TikTok said it had no (57) ________ to make the same option (58) ________ to users in the
UK. A spokesperson said the company was making the changes for EEA users to adapt to the (59)
________ under the EU’s new Digital Services Act, which does not apply in the UK. It is keeping the
situation (60) ________ review.
Part 2. For questions 61-73, read the following passage and do the tasks that follow.
Strong El Niño could make 2024 the first year we pass 1.5°C of warming
The country’s achievements in education have other nations doing their homework
A. A global shift to an El Niño climate pattern later this year could pave the way for the world
to breach 1.5°C of warming for the first time in 2024, according to the UK Met Office. New modeling
from the agency suggests the current three-year La Niña phase will end in March and this looks likely
to be followed by an El Niño pattern later this year.
B. “At the moment, the vast majority of forecasts are going into El Niño in the latter half of
2023,” says Adam Scaife at the Met Office. El Niño and La Niña are terms used to describe
fluctuations in Earth’s climate system, driven by changing sea surface temperatures in the equatorial
Pacific.
C. El Niño is declared when sea temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific rise 0.5°C above
the long- term average. La Niña describes the opposite side of the fluctuation when eastern Pacific
temperatures drop below average. Both phenomena trigger shifts in weather patterns around the world,
affecting everything from heatwave risks in Australia to rainfall patterns in Chile. Because El Niño
events bring higher than average temperatures, they can also temporarily drive up the global average
temperature.
D. A shift later this year to a strong El Niño that pushes Pacific sea surface temperatures to 3°C
above average could temporarily raise the global average temperature by 0.3°C, says Scaife. This
would come on top of the existing 1.2°C increase in global temperatures since pre-industrial times,
caused by rising greenhouse gas emissions.
E. Taken together, it could mean average temperatures in 2024 could reach 1.5°C above pre-
industrial levels, he says. “If you add on a big El Niño… then we’re going to get close, potentially, to
the first year of 1.5 degrees,” he says. Countries set a goal to limit global warming to 1.5°C in the 2015
Paris Agreement, but that aim would only be missed if such a temperature rise is sustained over a
couple of decades.
F. Last month, the Met Office predicted that 2023 could be one of Earth’s hottest years on
record, an expectation partly driven by an anticipated swing to El Niño. A global shift to El Niño could
bring relief to parts of Chile, Argentina and the southwest US, which have suffered lengthy droughts as
a result of La Niña.
G. But it would probably cause disruption to Indonesia’s monsoon season, impacting rice
production in the country, and increase the risk of severe heat waves and wildfires in Australia.
Warmer sea temperatures also bring a heightened threat of bleaching in tropical coral reefs. Terry
Hughes at James Cook University in Townsville, Australia, says the prospect of a strong El Niño later
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this year is “terrifying” for the Great Barrier Reef. “I would expect that the next strong El Niño will
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
have a very serious impact on the Great Barrier Reef given that we saw bleaching for the first time in
La Niña in early 2022,” he says. NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
H. But some researchers caution it is too early to tell how strong any El Niño might be. A mild
El Niño would raise global temperatures, but not enough to breach 1.5°C.
I. “It’s probably a better than 50/50 bet that there will be an El Niño next winter,” says David
Battisti at the University of Washington in Seattle. “How big it’s going to be is anybody’s guess.”
J. Others say it is too early to say for certain there will be an El Niño this year. Pedro DiNezio
at the University of Colorado Boulder points out the uncertainties in predicting the occurrence of El
Niño this early in the year, before the so-called spring predictability barrier. They liken the accuracy of
El Niño prediction models to “weather forecasting 30 years ago”. “This early in the year, I would not
bank on an El Niño happening,” says DiNezio.
For questions 61-67, decide whether the following statements are True (T), False (F) or Not Given
(NG).
Question Answe
r

Question 61. A global transition to an El Nio climatic pattern later this year might open the
door for the globe to surpass 1.5°C of warming for the first time in 2024.

Question 62. Changing sea surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific are the primary
cause of El Nio and La Nia.

Question 63. El Nio has contrasting fluctuations to La Nia, which ensures temperature
stability in global weather patterns.

Question 64. According to Scaife, a strong El Nio later this year might briefly increase the
world average temperature by 0.3°C.

Question 65. Rising greenhouse gas emissions have been the only cause of the increase in
global temperatures since pre-industrial times.

Question 66. If a strong El Nio is absent, it might result in 2024 having average
temperatures that are 1.5°C higher than pre-industrial levels.

Question 67. The aim of the Paris Agreement would only be missed if current temperatures
could be kept unchanged over a couple of decades.
For questions 68-73, read the following sentences and fill in each blank with NO MORE THAN
THREE WORDS taken from the passage.
Question 68: Areas experiencing protracted _______ as a result of La Nia, might get respite from a
global transition to El Nio.
Question 69: A greater risk of coral bleaching on _______ is also brought on by warmer water
temperatures.
Question 70: Terry Hughes predicted that the next big El Nio would have a very substantial impact on
the _______.
Question 71: _______ would rise with a weak El Nio, but not by more than 1.5°C.
Question 72: David Battisti says no one knows how huge an El Nio _______ is going to be.
Question 73: _______ asserts that he would not bet on an El Nio developing this early in the year.

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Part 3. In the passage below, seven paragraphs have been removed. For questions 74-80, read the
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
passage and choose from paragraphs A-H the one which fits each gap. There is ONE extra
paragraph which you do not need to use. NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Self-knowledge: How to know your true personality and why it matters
When it comes to knowing yourself, your own perception of your personality doesn’t
necessarily align with that of people around you. But which is more accurate? And can discovering
your true nature lead to a better life?
74
Let’s be honest: sometimes I wonder if people think I’m more obnoxious than I realise.
Because presumably you wouldn’t know. That is partly where the intrigue lies for me. How accurately
do we see ourselves? And who is the real you anyway – the person you think you are, or the person
other people see?
75
In search of answers, I did what most sensible people tend to avoid: I solicited honest insights
into my nature from a dozen friends, family members and colleagues. I asked them to fill out a 60-
point questionnaire designed by psychologists to assess personality, and to give the two traits they
most associate with me – one positive and one negative. Then I waited nervously for the scales to fall
from my eyes.
76
In one sense, it is impossible to avoid knowing yourself. You are constantly thinking about
how you feel, what you are going to eat tonight and so on. In addition, we each have privileged
knowledge of our own personal history, our own thoughts and feelings and what we get up to when no
one else is looking. So you might think we know all there is to know about our true selves, which I am
defining here not as some immutable inner essence, but as the way you typically think, feel and behave
over years or decades. Your personality, in other words. And yet it is far from clear that we can gain an
accurate picture even of that.
77
“There is no direct pipeline to your true self,” says Simine Vazire, a psychologist at the
University of Melbourne in Australia. “How a group of other people, who know you well across
different contexts and who have different biases to one another, see you might be the closest you can
get to a good accuracy criterion for what you’re really like.”
78
“Our self-perceptions do generally predict our behaviour pretty well,” says Lauren Human, a
psychologist at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. They also correspond well with the
perceptions of people who are close to us, she says. That chimed with my own feedback experience. I
used an online version of a test called the Big Five Inventory-2, which is based on a model that
psychologists use to assess personality. It divides our personalities into five independent traits:
extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness to experience and neuroticism and gives you
a score out of 100 for each. When I took the test, I scored highly on extroversion (71) and open-
mindedness (96), middling on agreeableness (65) and low on neuroticism (48) and conscientiousness
(46).
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But it’s not as if I wasn’t aware of those traits, even though I can now see that I might have
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
underestimated their extent. So, broadly speaking, the discrepancies between self and others’
perceptions were small enough to make me thinkNĂMI know HỌC
myself2023 - 2024
pretty well.
80
The paragraphs
A. When other people’s perceptions of me came trickling in, I was struck by how similar they
looked to my own. There were a few differences, of course. On the test, several people rated
me higher than I did on extroversion and conscientiousness, for example. A handful of my
volunteers very much warmed to their second task, sending a barrage of negative traits they
associate with me that aren’t captured in the Big Five scores. Highlights included “strident”,
“belligerent”, “intractable” and – from someone we will call Ben because that is his name – the
instant classic, “Is there a German word for not letting you get a word in edgeways?”
B. In a few studies, researchers have been able to compare self-perceptions with third-party
observations of behaviour. One group compared people’s self-ratings on their core personality
traits with behavioural indicators of each of those traits in a lab environment, and found that
there was a reasonably good correlation between self-perceptions and actual behaviour. Similar
results have been reported from experiments in real world settings, where researchers measured
behaviour using audio recordings of participants’ daily life.
C. The call to “know thyself” echoes from antiquity. Socrates famously declared that the
unexamined life isn’t worth living. But for the ancient Greek philosophers, the pursuit of self-
knowledge was a dialogue with others to figure out human nature and how to govern. The
focus on introspection came to the fore later, in the 17th century, with René Descartes. “The
idea that we sit and just reflect on ourselves, that navel-gazing, is distinctively modern and
Western,” says Mitchell Green, a philosopher at the University of Connecticut who has studied
self-knowledge.
D. There is some debate about the reliability of such tests, but given the multiple problems
associated with trying to figure all this out by yourself, they are probably more reliable than
your own self-judgement. And it is surely useful to be aware of how society has shaped your
assumptions about others.
E. Ever wondered what other people think of you – I mean, what they really think of you? I
consider myself decent company, for instance, even if I know I get a bit vociferous after a few
pints of bitter. I like to think I am open-minded and considerate, too, though I recognise I can
be dismissive at times. But lately, particularly the morning after a few of those pints, I have
become curious about how other people see me.
F. It isn’t that I am self-obsessed, you understand. I am just intrigued about the extent to which the
way people see my personality tallies with the way I view myself. Ultimately, I wonder
whether being more aware of these shadowy hinterlands of self-knowledge might make life
better – not only for me, but for those who spend time with me. Did I say I wasn’t self-
obsessed?
G. For psychologists, the question is an empirical one. The trouble is that self-perception presents
a particularly thorny case of the “criterion problem” – that is, how can you assess the accuracy
of the way you perceive yourself without an objective criterion for comparison? In recent years,
researchers have tried to overcome this by comparing self-perceptions with other people’s
perceptions of you.
H. As you might expect, however, the devil is in the detail. Psychologists have demonstrated
again and again that the way we see ourselves is modulated by a smorgasbord of cognitive

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biases that serve to make us all, to a greater or lesser extent, deluded about who we are. “Our
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
self-perceptions are far from perfectly accurate,” says Vazire.
Part 4. For questions 81-90, read a passageNĂM HỌCimmune
on the human 2023system
- 2024and choose the answer
(A, B, C or D) which fits best according to the passage.
The secrets of how sharks survived so many of Earth's mass extinctions
Vegetarianism and underwater volcanoes have helped sharks survive for half a billion years.
But can they use their skills to cope with climate change?
The beach at Muizenberg outside Cape Town is a Mecca for wannabe surf bums. But when the
beach siren sounds, surfers and swimmers alike tend to lose their cool. That distinctive rolling wail is a
warning that sharks may be nearby. Everyone knows the drill – get out of the water as quickly as you
can.
[A] The mere suggestion of a shark is enough to conjure fear in many of us. [B] But sharks also
inspire awe. It isn’t just their elegance or physicality; equally impressive is their tenacity. [C] That
makes them older than humanity, older than Mount Everest, older than dinosaurs, older even than
trees. [D]
It is possible that sharks just got lucky in the lottery of life. But over the past few years,
scientists have discovered that the fish possess some unusual qualities that allow them to be super-
adaptable in the face of change, including a fondness for hanging out around underwater volcanoes.
The big question now is whether these qualities will help sharks survive the current sixth mass
extinction, triggered by human activities. Today, sharks face a new challenge, far deadlier than any
they have ever encountered.
Sharks, along with rays, skates and chimaeras, make up a group of fish known as
chondrichthyes, characterised by a cartilaginous skeleton. Fossil scales found in Siberia indicate that
sharks originated in the Silurian period, which began about 440 million years ago. It was a time when
the world was warm, sea levels were high and corals reefs were starting to appear. Since then,
thousands of shark species have existed, culminating in a golden age about 360 million years ago,
when they dominated the oceans, taking many weird and wonderful forms. Today, there are more than
450 shark species, ranging from well-known ones such as great whites and hammerheads to the exotic
and bizarre, including goblin sharks, cookiecutter sharks and Japanese wobbegong.
Of course, many shark species are now extinct, but that is to be expected. It is estimated that
extinction has been the fate of more than 99 per cent of all plants and animals that have ever lived. The
puzzle instead is how sharks as a group have survived for so long. Paleontologist Sora Kim at the
University of California, Merced, who studies ancient and modern sharks, sees one clue in their faeces.
“When a shark poops, there’s hardly any solids,” she says. “It’s more of a clearish goo.” This indicates
that they possess a highly efficient digestive system able to process almost all of what they eat. That
can be helpful if food gets scarce, says Kim, which is likely to happen during a mass extinction event.
Earth’s third and biggest mass extinction, for example, which happened about 252 million years ago,
saw upwards of 96 per cent of all marine life disappear.
As well as letting very few nutrients go to waste, sharks are also surprisingly unfussy eaters. A
few years ago, Kim and her colleagues studied the diet of great white sharks by analysing chemical
signatures in their backbones. “When I started the project, I thought, well, white sharks devour seals
and sea lions,” she says. That was the received wisdom. “I was really surprised that that’s not what I
saw.” They don’t turn their nose up at these animals, but they seem just as happy consuming other prey
such as squid. “Even though we think of them as being apex predators at the top of the food chain, they
definitely aren’t that all of the time,” says Kim. In fact, research published last year reveals one shark
species, the bonnethead, is omnivorous, consuming copious amounts of seagrass along with shellfish.
Such dietary flexibility would have worked in sharks’ favour when the going got tough.

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More evidence of shark adaptability comes from their teeth. Unlike their cartilaginous skeleton,
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
the teeth are extremely hard, which gives them a good chance of being preserved in the fossil record.
NĂMtoHỌC
In Canada’s Northwest Territories, teeth belonging 2023
sand tiger sharks-litter
2024ancient sediments near
the Muskox and Eames rivers. They are between 53 and 38 million years old, dating from the Eocene,
an epoch when Earth was about 9°C to 14°C warmer than it is today. Ice caps melt in warmer worlds,
and their freshwater drains into the oceans. This makes ocean water less salty, which can be a problem
for fish species that require specific salt levels to survive. But it doesn’t seem to have bothered the
Eocene sand tiger shark: the chemistry of its teeth suggests that it was living in far less salty waters
than its counterparts inhabit today.
Question 81: According to the passage, why does the writer say swimmers “lose their cool”?
A. They feel scared due to the temporary siren sounds.
B. They are suddenly conscious of the threat in the area.
C. They become exhausted after hearing the warning sounds.
D. They are concerned about potential surfers frequenting the shore.
Question 82: Which of the following square brackets [A], [B], [C], or [D] best indicates where in the
paragraph the sentence "As a group, sharks have been around for at least 420 million years,
meaning they have survived four of the “big five” mass extinctions." can be inserted?
A. [A] B. [B] C. [C] D. [D]
Question 83: According to paragraph 3, sharks _______.
A. have been very fortunate in their annual reproduction
B. have had certain peculiar characteristics
C. have attributes enabling them to ensure its stability
D. want to reside close to underwater volcanoes
Question 84: The word “triggered” in paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to _______.
A. stimulated B. possessed C. eliminated D. impressed
Question 85: According to paragraph 4, what can be inferred about sharks?
A. They could have evolved during another epoch apart from the Silurian period.
B. They would probably adapt themselves to cold climates and low-level water.
C. There would probably be other types of sharks that have not been identified.
D. There might be some sharks that contribute to the disappearance of coral reefs.
Question 86: According to paragraph 5, what is true about sharks?
A. It is a possibility that many of their species could suffer a threat of extinction.
B. More than 99 per cent of those that have ever lived are thought to have died out.
C. A paleontologist disagrees that scarcely any solids are present in a shark's excrement.
D. They have a very effective digestive system that can break down practically all of their food.
Question 87: The word “devour” in paragraph 6 is closest in meaning to _______.
A. mistake B. hunt C. raise D. eat
Question 88: According to paragraph 6, Kim asserts that _______.
A. the received wisdom is surprising to her and her colleagues
B. sharks are equally content to eat other types of animals
C. sometimes sharks are hunted by other animals at the top of the food chain
D. sharks used to be omnivorous due to their nutritional adaptability
Question 89: According to the passage, what characteristics do sharks’ teeth have?
A. ability to defossilise B. durability C. flexibility D. reusability
Question 90: According to the passage, the Muskox and Eames rivers are where _______.
A. sharks survived fossilisation and preserved their teeth
B. sand tiger shark teeth are scattered throughout the old sediments
C. salt content of ocean water can be problematic for shark species
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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
D. freshwater drains into the oceans, leading to much less salinity
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
Part 5. The passage below consists of four paragraphs (A-D). For questions 91-100, read the
passage and do the tasks that follow. NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Pop Art
A. This art movement emerged in Britain in the late 1950s, moving to the USA in the early
sixties. The term “pop art” was coined by British art critic Laurence Alloway and, by the mid-60s, the
movement had been recognized. Pop art is characterized by themes drawn from mass culture; pop
artists used the common imagery of consumer items, comic strips and other mass media sources as a
means of expression. Artists such as Johns, Lichtenstein and Warhol aimed to use popular images
rather than elitist ones in their work, thus making art more accessible to a wider audience. The art
establishment reacted in a hostile way, deriding this new genre, mirroring later condemnations of
modern art. However, it quickly gained in popularity, again proving that innovation triumphs over
conservatism.
B. One of the pioneers of the emerging movement was French artist Marcel Duchamp. His
work and its underlying ideas are thought to have altered the definition of art and our way of engaging
with it. He was famous for taking existing objects from the contexts in which they usually appeared
and exhibiting them as art. This approach to art can be seen as a reaction to the Abstract Expressionism
that was already dominating the art scene at that time. This was a post- World War Two American
movement – the first American movement to have a global influence and to allow New York City to
usurp Paris as the center of the art world. The Abstract Expressionists were interested in the use of
color and shape producing such works as canvases covered entirely in paint of one color. Their works
revealed a very specific attitude to life and art and can be regarded as an anarchic, somewhat nihilistic,
movement. One of the most influential and well-known of the Abstract Expressionists was Jackson
Pollock. The kind of works he produced fell into category of this movement known as Action Painting,
in which the canvas was viewed as the artist’s arena and the act of filling it was an irrational,
instinctive process. By the early 1960s, however, the movement seemed to be running out of steam and
pop art stepped in to fill the space. In fact, in 1962, when a large scale pop art exhibition called the
New Realists was mounted at the Sidney Janis Gallery in New York City, the movement attracted
much interest.
C. Despite common origins, both British and American pop art movements do differ
somewhat. In Britain, the artists were intrigued by the obsolescence of consumer goods, in particular
the American automobile. Their works focused on goods that would soon require replacement. In the
USA, however, there was more emphasis on comic strips and advertising. American artists
reproduced, duplicated and arranged together various visual images from American culture such as
soft drinks, fast food, film stars, and comics. Unlike the British pop artists, the Americans did not
romanticize the images they portrayed. Their works were more realistic. They also had a tendency to
be ironic, playful and entertaining.
D. The most well-known of all the American pop artists has to be Andy Warhol. Born in 1928
in Pittsburgh to immigrant parents, he studied design and art history at the Carnegie Institute of
Technology in his hometown. In 1949, he relocated to New York City and worked mainly in
advertising. In 1952, he mounted an exhibition at the Hugo Gallery, the first of many. It was in 1962,
in the early years of the American pop art movement, that he produced some of his most famous
works: silkscreen prints of Campbell’s Soup cans, dollar bills and Marilyn Monroe. Warhol’s body of
work included portraits, films and sculpture. He also wrote a novel and a work of nonfiction (The
Philosophy of Andy Warhol).
In which section are the following mentioned? Answer

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
DỰ THI
Question 91. a shift in the traditional heartCHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
of the art world

Question 92. the inclination towards idealizedNĂM imageryHỌC

among2023 - 2024
certain pop artists

Question 93. pioneering artists ridiculed by contemporaries in the art world

Question 94. an artist who paved the way for the development of pop art

Question 95. successfully engaging the common man with art

Question 96. the philosophy of a once prominent art form

Question 97. the initial diffusion of pop art across the Atlantic

Question 98. stylistic variations within pop art

Question 99. an artist producing works across a wide range of media

Question 100. the fading of the significance of an artistic movement

IV. WRITING (55/200 points)

Part 1. Graph writing (20 points)
The information below gives details about time spent on smartphones and tablets by
category. Summarize the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make
comparisons where relevant.
You should write about 150 words.

__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
Part 2. Essay writing (35 points)
Write an essay of 350 words on the following topic:

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
Language learning should go beyond rote memorization and grammar rules, to suggest the
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
contrary is harmful to developing communicative skills and real-life language use.
Discuss the statement and state your opinion. NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________
_____THE END_____

ANSWER KEY
I. LISTENING (50/200 points)
Part 1. For questions 1-5, listen to a talk about the brain and decide whether these statements are
True (T), False (F) or Not Given (NG).
Question Answer

Question 1. Incoordination is a side effect of epilepsy treatment in post-split patients. NG

Question 2. The speaking brain has no control over the non-speaking brain's vision and T
subsequent picking action.

Question 3. Incompatibility in actions demonstrates a new “you” in each individual. F

Question 4. Regardless of any confusion from right brain's surprising actions, the speaking T
brain will attempt to decipher them.

Question 5. The fact that the two cerebral hemispheres have always coexisted explains their T
ability to keep up with each other.
Part 2. For questions 6-10, listen to a piece of news and answer the questions. Write NO MORE
THAN THREE WORDS taken from recording for each answer.
Question 6. What behaviour does orchid mantis display?
→ aggressive mimicry
Question 7. What does Anglerfish use to hunt?
→ luminous bait
Question 8. Which part of our body allows us to acknowledge the mantis?
→ visual system
Question 9. What is the unique disguise of orchid mantis regarded as?
→ camouflage category
Question 10. Whose disguise strategies have remained as a mystery to human for a long time?
→ predators and parasites
Part 3. You will hear an interview with a woman called Tansy Burton, who runs a company which
makes beauty products. For questions 11-15, choose the answer (A, B, C or D) which fits best
according to what you hear.
Question 11: To what does Tansy attribute her success as a businessperson?
A. It was a family tradition

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
B. It reflects her early training
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
C. It grew out of a desire to please people.
D. It’s something which came naturally to herNĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Question 12: What was Tansy’s main role in setting up the production company?
A. drawing up a business plan
B. attracting sufficient investment
C. responding to customer preferences
D. establishing administrative systems
Question 13: According to Tansy, her fragrances are successful because they _______.
A. are elegantly packaged
B. appeal to a wide range of people
C. suggest an expensive lifestyle
D. reflect changes in consumer taste
Question 14: Increasingly, Tansy sees people’s choice of fragrances as a reflection of the wearer’s
_______.
A. social standing B. taste in other products
C. emotional state D. financial situation
Question 15: In the future, Tansy expects to see _______.
A. a wider use of fragrances in society
B. fewer companies involved in producing fragrances
C. single products fulfilling a range of functions
D. increasing profitability for producers of fragrances
Part 4: You will hear a news programme about a climate change report. For question 16-25, listen
and complete the summary below by writing NO MORE THAN THREE WORDS AND/OR A
NUMBER for each answer. Write your answers in the corresponding numbered boxes on your
answer sheet. (20 points)
During the frying process, the chemical reactions give the food the crispy (16) outer layer.
The bubble that appears is actually water leaving the ingredient, leading to the next stages. The
first stage is oil uptake, where the surface (17) dehydrates, forming the crispy crust and gaps of
(18) water molecules. The next stage is called heat transfer. As the outside layer of molecules is
heated up thanks to (19) convection, the inside is heated up through conduction. The batter acts
as a layer to protect the (20) moisture of the inside and give the dish extra flavour. Adding beer
to the batter can be an ideal choice, since the carbon dioxide in the beer forms bubbles that fluff
up the batter and (21) foaming agents. When frying food, some types of oil are superior to
others, bringing different (22) nutritional benefits, flavour and having different smoke points.
For example, corn oil made up of polyunsaturated fats with weak (23) carbon-hydrogen bonds
boils at lower temperatures. This is because this type of oil generate (24) volatile compounds. It
is suggested that we choose oil with high smoke point and apply knowledge about heat transfer
and (25) fat content when cooking.
II. LEXICO-GRAMMAR (25/200 points)
Part 1. For questions 26-45, choose the correct answer A, B, C, or D to each of the following
questions.
Question 26: The city stopped urban _______ by rebuilding neighborhoods.
A. scourge B. rot C. bane D. blight
Question 27: He drove out of Brighton cheerfully enough, munching his sandwich, climbing the
London road until he had _______ the Downs.
A. aped B. breasted C. winged D. capped
Question 28: Amanda was sent on _______ to their offices in Hong Kong.
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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
A. transference B. relocation C. adjustment D. attachment
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
Question 29: The store will be closed this afternoon due to staffing shortages. _______ adjust.
A. Kindly B. Tenderly NĂMC.HỌC 2023 - 2024
Delicately D. Tolerantly
Question 30: She leaned forward to watch the _______ children from the window.
A. meddlesome B. peroxisome C. frolicsome D. nettlesome
Question 31: A robin was _______ on the fence.
A. perching B. rodding C. roosting D. branching
Question 32: Floodlighted, the white marble gleamed with a snowy _______.
A. fluorescence B. incandescence C. phosphorescence D. opalescence
Question 33: Barker was doing what Johnson would call a _______ of honour, circling the room
saying goodbyes.
A. knot B. lap C. round D. ring
Question 34: One end of the channel _______ led to the Gulf, the other to a dead end.
A. fortuitously B. gratuitously C. circuitously D. felicitously
Question 35: After the floods, volunteers _______ with trucks to help the three thousand residents.
A. touched up B. dealt in C. flung off D. pitched in
Question 36: The car was launched with a massive media _______, involving newspapers, magazines,
television and radio.
A. raid B. blitz C. blast D. spree
Question 37: She described the new criminal bill as a _______ attack on democracy.
A. eccentric B. licentious C. lunatic D. perfidious
Question 38: Disney World was like an ordinary amusement park with _______ on.
A. knobs B. boots C. hats D. ties
Question 39: The law has never prevented clever lawyers from finding ways of tax _______ for their
clients.
A. evasion B. avoidance C. exemption D. impunity
Question 40: We have to incorporate new technologies. We can’t afford to be _______ by our
competitors.
A. looked askance B. kept posted C. put paid D. caught napping
Question 41: We can just get a sandwich if you want – that won’t break _______.
A. the mould B. the ice C. the bank D. the means
Question 42: The game will not be disrupted or _______ destroyed by the decision of a player to leave
the game prematurely.
A. fortuitously B. maliciously C. haphazardly D. offhandedly
Question 43: When Mary has an exam to take, she either studies day and night or does nothing at all.
She can never find the _______.
A. a double bind B. a leading light C. the common touch D. the happy medium
Question 44: Still doubtful of the success of the _______ “flying machines”, the writer mused that
“comparatively few of us have any desire to float in the air at a great height from the earth”.
A. bedraggled B. newfangled C. credentialed D. bespectacled
Question 45: Facebook's shares are _______ after the company launched a new Instagram feature that
will compete with TikTok in the US.
A. on a tear B. on high skies C. coming up roses D. holding their thumbs
Part 2. For questions 46-50, write the correct form of each bracketed word in each sentence in the
numbered space provided in the column on the right.
Question 46: Olga was a redoubtable debater with a caustic tongue in polemics and a nice touch in
irony in writing. (DOUBT)

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
Question 47: Their performances were shambolic with guitar strings snapping - as ever - and the
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
timing fluctuating erratically. (SHAMBLES)
Question 48: Chicken farmers have strengthened NĂM HỌC 2023
biosecurity to prevent- contamination
2024 from people
who have visited live-bird markets. (SECURE)
Question 49: There is no gainsaying the technical brilliance of his performance. (SAY)
Question 50: The coronation ceremony was a grand affair, where the new monarch was enthroned
amidst cheers and celebrations. (THRONE)
III. READING (70/200 points)
Part 1. For questions 51-60, read the following text and fill in the blank with ONE suitable word.
TikTok users in the UK face being (51) left with a “less safe” and “more toxic” (52) version of
the app than those in Europe after the tech (53) giant was forced to make its algorithm optional there
to (54) comply with EU rules. From the end of August, TikTok users in 30
countries in the European Economic Area will be able to opt out of receiving (55) personalised
content recommendations, which are largely (56) generated based on past activity. Instead, their “For
You” and live feeds will include popular videos from the places they live and around the world. This
weekend, TikTok said it had no (57) plans to make the same option (58) available to users in the UK.
A spokesperson said the company was making the changes for EEA users to adapt to the (59)
requirements under the EU’s new Digital Services Act, which does not apply in the UK. It is keeping
the situation (60) under review.
Part 2. For questions 61-73, read the following passage and do the tasks that follow.
Strong El Niño could make 2024 the first year we pass 1.5°C of warming
The country’s achievements in education have other nations doing their homework
A. A global shift to an El Niño climate pattern later this year could pave the way for the world
to breach 1.5°C of warming for the first time in 2024, according to the UK Met Office. New modeling
from the agency suggests the current three-year La Niña phase will end in March and this looks likely
to be followed by an El Niño pattern later this year.
B. “At the moment, the vast majority of forecasts are going into El Niño in the latter half of
2023,” says Adam Scaife at the Met Office. El Niño and La Niña are terms used to describe
fluctuations in Earth’s climate system, driven by changing sea surface temperatures in the equatorial
Pacific.
C. El Niño is declared when sea temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific rise 0.5°C above
the long- term average. La Niña describes the opposite side of the fluctuation when eastern Pacific
temperatures drop below average. Both phenomena trigger shifts in weather patterns around the world,
affecting everything from heatwave risks in Australia to rainfall patterns in Chile. Because El Niño
events bring higher than average temperatures, they can also temporarily drive up the global average
temperature.
D. A shift later this year to a strong El Niño that pushes Pacific sea surface temperatures to 3°C
above average could temporarily raise the global average temperature by 0.3°C, says Scaife. This
would come on top of the existing 1.2°C increase in global temperatures since pre-industrial times,
caused by rising greenhouse gas emissions.
E. Taken together, it could mean average temperatures in 2024 could reach 1.5°C above pre-
industrial levels, he says. “If you add on a big El Niño… then we’re going to get close, potentially, to
the first year of 1.5 degrees,” he says. Countries set a goal to limit global warming to 1.5°C in the 2015
Paris Agreement, but that aim would only be missed if such a temperature rise is sustained over a
couple of decades.
F. Last month, the Met Office predicted that 2023 could be one of Earth’s hottest years on
record, an expectation partly driven by an anticipated swing to El Niño. A global shift to El Niño could

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
bring relief to parts of Chile, Argentina and the southwest US, which have suffered lengthy droughts as
a result of La Niña.
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
G. But it would probably cause disruptionNĂMtoHỌC 2023
Indonesia’s - 2024
monsoon season, impacting rice
production in the country, and increase the risk of severe heat waves and wildfires in Australia.
Warmer sea temperatures also bring a heightened threat of bleaching in tropical coral reefs. Terry
Hughes at James Cook University in Townsville, Australia, says the prospect of a strong El Niño later
this year is “terrifying” for the Great Barrier Reef. “I would expect that the next strong El Niño will
have a very serious impact on the Great Barrier Reef given that we saw bleaching for the first time in
La Niña in early 2022,” he says.
H. But some researchers caution it is too early to tell how strong any El Niño might be. A mild
El Niño would raise global temperatures, but not enough to breach 1.5°C.
I. “It’s probably a better than 50/50 bet that there will be an El Niño next winter,” says David
Battisti at the University of Washington in Seattle. “How big it’s going to be is anybody’s guess.”
J. Others say it is too early to say for certain there will be an El Niño this year. Pedro DiNezio
at the University of Colorado Boulder points out the uncertainties in predicting the occurrence of El
Niño this early in the year, before the so-called spring predictability barrier. They liken the accuracy of
El Niño prediction models to “weather forecasting 30 years ago”. “This early in the year, I would not
bank on an El Niño happening,” says DiNezio.
For questions 61-67, decide whether the following statements are True (T), False (F) or Not Given
(NG).
Question Answer

Question 61. A global transition to an El Nio climatic pattern later this year might open TRUE
the door for the globe to surpass 1.5°C of warming for the first time in 2024.

Question 62. Changing sea surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific are the primary TRUE
cause of El Nio and La Nia.

Question 63. El Nio has contrasting fluctuations to La Nia, which ensures temperature FALSE
stability in global weather patterns.

Question 64. According to Scaife, a strong El Nio later this year might briefly increase TRUE
the world average temperature by 0.3°C.

Question 65. Rising greenhouse gas emissions have been the only cause of the increase NOT
in global temperatures since pre-industrial times. GIVEN

Question 66. If a strong El Nio is absent, it might result in 2024 having average FALSE
temperatures that are 1.5°C higher than pre-industrial levels.

Question 67. The aim of the Paris Agreement would only be missed if current FALSE
temperatures could be kept unchanged over a couple of decades.
For questions 68-73, read the following sentences and fill in each blank with NO MORE THAN
THREE WORDS taken from the passage.
Question 68: Areas experiencing protracted droughts as a result of La Nia, might get respite from a
global transition to El Nio.
Question 69: A greater risk of coral bleaching on tropical reefs is also brought on by warmer water
temperatures.

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
Question 70: Terry Hughes predicted that the next big El Nio would have a very substantial impact on
the Great Barrier Reef.
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
Question 71: Global temperatures would rise NĂM HỌC
with a weak 2023
El Nio, - 2024
but not by more than 1.5°C.
Question 72: David Battisti says no one knows how huge an El Nio next winter is going to be.
Question 73: (Pedro) DiNezio asserts that he would not bet on an El Nio developing this early in the
year.
Part 3. In the passage below, seven paragraphs have been removed. For questions 74-80, read the
passage and choose from paragraphs A-H the one which fits each gap. There is ONE extra
paragraph which you do not need to use.
Self-knowledge: How to know your true personality and why it matters
When it comes to knowing yourself, your own perception of your personality doesn’t
necessarily align with that of people around you. But which is more accurate? And can discovering
your true nature lead to a better life?
74 E
Let’s be honest: sometimes I wonder if people think I’m more obnoxious than I realise.
Because presumably you wouldn’t know. That is partly where the intrigue lies for me. How accurately
do we see ourselves? And who is the real you anyway – the person you think you are, or the person
other people see?
75 F
In search of answers, I did what most sensible people tend to avoid: I solicited honest insights
into my nature from a dozen friends, family members and colleagues. I asked them to fill out a 60-
point questionnaire designed by psychologists to assess personality, and to give the two traits they
most associate with me – one positive and one negative. Then I waited nervously for the scales to fall
from my eyes.
76 C
In one sense, it is impossible to avoid knowing yourself. You are constantly thinking about
how you feel, what you are going to eat tonight and so on. In addition, we each have privileged
knowledge of our own personal history, our own thoughts and feelings and what we get up to when no
one else is looking. So you might think we know all there is to know about our true selves, which I am
defining here not as some immutable inner essence, but as the way you typically think, feel and behave
over years or decades. Your personality, in other words. And yet it is far from clear that we can gain an
accurate picture even of that.
77 G
“There is no direct pipeline to your true self,” says Simine Vazire, a psychologist at the
University of Melbourne in Australia. “How a group of other people, who know you well across
different contexts and who have different biases to one another, see you might be the closest you can
get to a good accuracy criterion for what you’re really like.”
78 B
“Our self-perceptions do generally predict our behaviour pretty well,” says Lauren Human, a
psychologist at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. They also correspond well with the
perceptions of people who are close to us, she says. That chimed with my own feedback experience. I
used an online version of a test called the Big Five Inventory-2, which is based on a model that
psychologists use to assess personality. It divides our personalities into five independent traits:
extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, openness to experience and neuroticism and gives you

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
a score out of 100 for each. When I took the test, I scored highly on extroversion (71) and open-
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
mindedness (96), middling on agreeableness (65) and low on neuroticism (48) and conscientiousness
(46). NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
79 A
But it’s not as if I wasn’t aware of those traits, even though I can now see that I might have
underestimated their extent. So, broadly speaking, the discrepancies between self and others’
perceptions were small enough to make me think I know myself pretty well.
80 H
The paragraphs
A. When other people’s perceptions of me came trickling in, I was struck by how similar they
looked to my own. There were a few differences, of course. On the test, several people rated
me higher than I did on extroversion and conscientiousness, for example. A handful of my
volunteers very much warmed to their second task, sending a barrage of negative traits they
associate with me that aren’t captured in the Big Five scores. Highlights included “strident”,
“belligerent”, “intractable” and – from someone we will call Ben because that is his name – the
instant classic, “Is there a German word for not letting you get a word in edgeways?”
B. In a few studies, researchers have been able to compare self-perceptions with third-party
observations of behaviour. One group compared people’s self-ratings on their core personality
traits with behavioural indicators of each of those traits in a lab environment, and found that
there was a reasonably good correlation between self-perceptions and actual behaviour. Similar
results have been reported from experiments in real world settings, where researchers measured
behaviour using audio recordings of participants’ daily life.
C. The call to “know thyself” echoes from antiquity. Socrates famously declared that the
unexamined life isn’t worth living. But for the ancient Greek philosophers, the pursuit of self-
knowledge was a dialogue with others to figure out human nature and how to govern. The
focus on introspection came to the fore later, in the 17th century, with René Descartes. “The
idea that we sit and just reflect on ourselves, that navel-gazing, is distinctively modern and
Western,” says Mitchell Green, a philosopher at the University of Connecticut who has studied
self-knowledge.
D. There is some debate about the reliability of such tests, but given the multiple problems
associated with trying to figure all this out by yourself, they are probably more reliable than
your own self-judgement. And it is surely useful to be aware of how society has shaped your
assumptions about others.
E. Ever wondered what other people think of you – I mean, what they really think of you? I
consider myself decent company, for instance, even if I know I get a bit vociferous after a few
pints of bitter. I like to think I am open-minded and considerate, too, though I recognise I can
be dismissive at times. But lately, particularly the morning after a few of those pints, I have
become curious about how other people see me.
F. It isn’t that I am self-obsessed, you understand. I am just intrigued about the extent to which the
way people see my personality tallies with the way I view myself. Ultimately, I wonder
whether being more aware of these shadowy hinterlands of self-knowledge might make life
better – not only for me, but for those who spend time with me. Did I say I wasn’t self-
obsessed?
G. For psychologists, the question is an empirical one. The trouble is that self-perception presents
a particularly thorny case of the “criterion problem” – that is, how can you assess the accuracy
of the way you perceive yourself without an objective criterion for comparison? In recent years,

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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
researchers have tried to overcome this by comparing self-perceptions with other people’s
perceptions of you.
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
H. As you might expect, however, the NĂM HỌC
devil is in 2023
the detail. - 2024have demonstrated
Psychologists
again and again that the way we see ourselves is modulated by a smorgasbord of cognitive
biases that serve to make us all, to a greater or lesser extent, deluded about who we are. “Our
self-perceptions are far from perfectly accurate,” says Vazire.
Part 4. For questions 81-90, read a passage on the human immune system and choose the answer
(A, B, C or D) which fits best according to the passage.
The secrets of how sharks survived so many of Earth's mass extinctions
Vegetarianism and underwater volcanoes have helped sharks survive for half a billion years.
But can they use their skills to cope with climate change?
The beach at Muizenberg outside Cape Town is a Mecca for wannabe surf bums. But when the
beach siren sounds, surfers and swimmers alike tend to lose their cool. That distinctive rolling wail is a
warning that sharks may be nearby. Everyone knows the drill – get out of the water as quickly as you
can.
[A] The mere suggestion of a shark is enough to conjure fear in many of us. [B] But sharks also
inspire awe. It isn’t just their elegance or physicality; equally impressive is their tenacity. [C] That
makes them older than humanity, older than Mount Everest, older than dinosaurs, older even than
trees. [D]
It is possible that sharks just got lucky in the lottery of life. But over the past few years,
scientists have discovered that the fish possess some unusual qualities that allow them to be super-
adaptable in the face of change, including a fondness for hanging out around underwater volcanoes.
The big question now is whether these qualities will help sharks survive the current sixth mass
extinction, triggered by human activities. Today, sharks face a new challenge, far deadlier than any
they have ever encountered.
Sharks, along with rays, skates and chimaeras, make up a group of fish known as
chondrichthyes, characterised by a cartilaginous skeleton. Fossil scales found in Siberia indicate that
sharks originated in the Silurian period, which began about 440 million years ago. It was a time when
the world was warm, sea levels were high and corals reefs were starting to appear. Since then,
thousands of shark species have existed, culminating in a golden age about 360 million years ago,
when they dominated the oceans, taking many weird and wonderful forms. Today, there are more than
450 shark species, ranging from well-known ones such as great whites and hammerheads to the exotic
and bizarre, including goblin sharks, cookiecutter sharks and Japanese wobbegong.
Of course, many shark species are now extinct, but that is to be expected. It is estimated that
extinction has been the fate of more than 99 per cent of all plants and animals that have ever lived. The
puzzle instead is how sharks as a group have survived for so long. Paleontologist Sora Kim at the
University of California, Merced, who studies ancient and modern sharks, sees one clue in their faeces.
“When a shark poops, there’s hardly any solids,” she says. “It’s more of a clearish goo.” This indicates
that they possess a highly efficient digestive system able to process almost all of what they eat. That
can be helpful if food gets scarce, says Kim, which is likely to happen during a mass extinction event.
Earth’s third and biggest mass extinction, for example, which happened about 252 million years ago,
saw upwards of 96 per cent of all marine life disappear.
As well as letting very few nutrients go to waste, sharks are also surprisingly unfussy eaters. A
few years ago, Kim and her colleagues studied the diet of great white sharks by analysing chemical
signatures in their backbones. “When I started the project, I thought, well, white sharks devour seals
and sea lions,” she says. That was the received wisdom. “I was really surprised that that’s not what I
saw.” They don’t turn their nose up at these animals, but they seem just as happy consuming other prey
such as squid. “Even though we think of them as being apex predators at the top of the food chain, they
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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
definitely aren’t that all of the time,” says Kim. In fact, research published last year reveals one shark
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
species, the bonnethead, is omnivorous, consuming copious amounts of seagrass along with shellfish.
Such dietary flexibility would have worked inNĂM HỌCwhen
sharks’ favour 2023 - 2024
the going got tough.
More evidence of shark adaptability comes from their teeth. Unlike their cartilaginous skeleton,
the teeth are extremely hard, which gives them a good chance of being preserved in the fossil record.
In Canada’s Northwest Territories, teeth belonging to sand tiger sharks litter ancient sediments near
the Muskox and Eames rivers. They are between 53 and 38 million years old, dating from the Eocene,
an epoch when Earth was about 9°C to 14°C warmer than it is today. Ice caps melt in warmer worlds,
and their freshwater drains into the oceans. This makes ocean water less salty, which can be a problem
for fish species that require specific salt levels to survive. But it doesn’t seem to have bothered the
Eocene sand tiger shark: the chemistry of its teeth suggests that it was living in far less salty waters
than its counterparts inhabit today.
Question 81: According to the passage, why does the writer say swimmers “lose their cool”?
A. They feel scared due to the temporary siren sounds.
B. They are suddenly conscious of the threat in the area.
C. They become exhausted after hearing the warning sounds.
D. They are concerned about potential surfers frequenting the shore.
Question 82: Which of the following square brackets [A], [B], [C], or [D] best indicates where in the
paragraph the sentence "As a group, sharks have been around for at least 420 million years,
meaning they have survived four of the “big five” mass extinctions." can be inserted?
A. [A] B. [B] C. [C] D. [D]
Question 83: According to paragraph 3, sharks _______.
A. have been very fortunate in their annual reproduction
B. have had certain peculiar characteristics
C. have attributes enabling them to ensure its stability
D. want to reside close to underwater volcanoes
Question 84: The word “triggered” in paragraph 3 is closest in meaning to _______.
A. stimulated B. possessed C. eliminated D. impressed
Question 85: According to paragraph 4, what can be inferred about sharks?
A. They could have evolved during another epoch apart from the Silurian period.
B. They would probably adapt themselves to cold climates and low-level water.
C. There would probably be other types of sharks that have not been identified.
D. There might be some sharks that contribute to the disappearance of coral reefs.
Question 86: According to paragraph 5, what is true about sharks?
A. It is a possibility that many of their species could suffer a threat of extinction.
B. More than 99 per cent of those that have ever lived are thought to have died out.
C. A paleontologist disagrees that scarcely any solids are present in a shark's excrement.
D. They have a very effective digestive system that can break down practically all of their food.
Question 87: The word “devour” in paragraph 6 is closest in meaning to _______.
A. mistake B. hunt C. raise D. eat
Question 88: According to paragraph 6, Kim asserts that _______.
A. the received wisdom is surprising to her and her colleagues
B. sharks are equally content to eat other types of animals
C. sometimes sharks are hunted by other animals at the top of the food chain
D. sharks used to be omnivorous due to their nutritional adaptability
Question 89: According to the passage, what characteristics do sharks’ teeth have?
A. ability to defossilise B. durability C. flexibility D. reusability
Question 90: According to the passage, the Muskox and Eames rivers are where _______.
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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
A. sharks survived fossilisation and preserved their teeth
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
B. sand tiger shark teeth are scattered throughout the old sediments
NĂMforHỌC
C. salt content of ocean water can be problematic 2023 - 2024
shark species
D. freshwater drains into the oceans, leading to much less salinity
Part 5. The passage below consists of four paragraphs (A-D). For questions 91-100, read the
passage and do the tasks that follow.
Pop Art
A. This art movement emerged in Britain in the late 1950s, moving to the USA in the early
sixties. The term “pop art” was coined by British art critic Laurence Alloway and, by the mid-60s, the
movement had been recognized. Pop art is characterized by themes drawn from mass culture; pop
artists used the common imagery of consumer items, comic strips and other mass media sources as a
means of expression. Artists such as Johns, Lichtenstein and Warhol aimed to use popular images
rather than elitist ones in their work, thus making art more accessible to a wider audience. The art
establishment reacted in a hostile way, deriding this new genre, mirroring later condemnations of
modern art. However, it quickly gained in popularity, again proving that innovation triumphs over
conservatism.
B. One of the pioneers of the emerging movement was French artist Marcel Duchamp. His
work and its underlying ideas are thought to have altered the definition of art and our way of engaging
with it. He was famous for taking existing objects from the contexts in which they usually appeared
and exhibiting them as art. This approach to art can be seen as a reaction to the Abstract Expressionism
that was already dominating the art scene at that time. This was a post- World War Two American
movement – the first American movement to have a global influence and to allow New York City to
usurp Paris as the center of the art world. The Abstract Expressionists were interested in the use of
color and shape producing such works as canvases covered entirely in paint of one color. Their works
revealed a very specific attitude to life and art and can be regarded as an anarchic, somewhat nihilistic,
movement. One of the most influential and well-known of the Abstract Expressionists was Jackson
Pollock. The kind of works he produced fell into category of this movement known as Action Painting,
in which the canvas was viewed as the artist’s arena and the act of filling it was an irrational,
instinctive process. By the early 1960s, however, the movement seemed to be running out of steam and
pop art stepped in to fill the space. In fact, in 1962, when a large scale pop art exhibition called the
New Realists was mounted at the Sidney Janis Gallery in New York City, the movement attracted
much interest.
C. Despite common origins, both British and American pop art movements do differ
somewhat. In Britain, the artists were intrigued by the obsolescence of consumer goods, in particular
the American automobile. Their works focused on goods that would soon require replacement. In the
USA, however, there was more emphasis on comic strips and advertising. American artists
reproduced, duplicated and arranged together various visual images from American culture such as
soft drinks, fast food, film stars, and comics. Unlike the British pop artists, the Americans did not
romanticize the images they portrayed. Their works were more realistic. They also had a tendency to
be ironic, playful and entertaining.
D. The most well-known of all the American pop artists has to be Andy Warhol. Born in 1928
in Pittsburgh to immigrant parents, he studied design and art history at the Carnegie Institute of
Technology in his hometown. In 1949, he relocated to New York City and worked mainly in
advertising. In 1952, he mounted an exhibition at the Hugo Gallery, the first of many. It was in 1962,
in the early years of the American pop art movement, that he produced some of his most famous
works: silkscreen prints of Campbell’s Soup cans, dollar bills and Marilyn Monroe. Warhol’s body of
work included portraits, films and sculpture. He also wrote a novel and a work of nonfiction (The
Philosophy of Andy Warhol).
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DỰ THI
In which section are theCHỌN
followingHỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
mentioned? Answer
NĂM
Question 91. a shift in the traditional heart of HỌC 2023 - 2024
the art world B

Question 92. the inclination towards idealized imagery among certain pop artists C

Question 93. pioneering artists ridiculed by contemporaries in the art world A

Question 94. an artist who paved the way for the development of pop art B

Question 95. successfully engaging the common man with art D

Question 96. the philosophy of a once prominent art form B

Question 97. the initial diffusion of pop art across the Atlantic A

Question 98. stylistic variations within pop art C

Question 99. an artist producing works across a wide range of media D

Question 100. the fading of the significance of an artistic movement B

IV. WRITING (55/200 points)
Part 1. Graph writing (20 points)
The information below gives details about time spent on smartphones and tablets by
category. Summarize the information by selecting and reporting the main features, and make
comparisons where relevant.
You should write about 150 words.

Contents
The report should:
• introduce the table and state its striking features,
• summarize the main features with relevant data from the table,
• make relevant comparisons.
Language use
The report should:
• demonstrate a wide variety of vocabulary and grammatical structures,
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 KỲ THI CHỌN ĐỘI TUYỂN
• have correct use of words and mechanics,
DỰ THI CHỌN HỌC SINH GIỎI QUỐC GIA
• maintain coherence, cohesion, and unity throughout.
Part 2. Essay writing (35 points) NĂM HỌC 2023 - 2024
Write an essay of 350 words on the following topic:
Language learning should go beyond rote memorization and grammar rules, to suggest the
contrary is harmful to developing communicative skills and real-life language use.
Discuss the statement and state your opinion.
Task achievement
The essay should:
• sufficiently address all requirements of the task,
• develop relevant supporting ideas with explanations, examples, evidence, etc.
Organization
The essay should have:
• an introduction presenting a clear thesis statement introducing the points to be developed,
• body paragraphs developing the points mentioned in the introduction,
• a conclusion summarizing the main points discussed in the essay.
Language use
The essay should:
• demonstrate a wide variety of vocabulary and grammatical structures,
• have correct use of words and mechanics,
• maintain coherence, cohesion, and unity throughout.

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