IELTS – Exam 1 – General Training Reading

IELTS General Training Reading Practice Test

Section 3: Reading passage 1

Questions 37 to 40

The Rise of AI

[A]
Artificial Intelligence (AI) has been around for some time. It is revolutionising industry, upping productivity, and altering the shape of technology. All good stuff, you might say, but since November 2022, when ChatGPT burst on the scene, it meant anyone—from CEOs to schoolkids—could use generative AI to solve problems, generate content, and answer questions. The number of users rapidly escalated, and more and more AIs emerged. Many generate text; some others create images in a range of styles, from colouring books to photographs. A few even create songs or make videos, and AI voice-overs are now so realistic that it is hard to distinguish whether the speaker is a real person or not. While the benefits are remarkable, there is a real fear of AI. Nobody truly believes AI will enslave humanity or that it spells doom for the human race, but there are some legitimate concerns.

[B]
The most commonly expressed fear is that AI will cause unemployment. AIs can do a wide range of tasks much faster than any human, and they don’t need a salary. Digital giant Getronics thinks that they may alter the way we work, but that concerns are unfounded because many jobs require cognitive abilities that AIs simply don’t possess—and likely never will. While relatively low-level jobs such as data entry might be at risk, the rest of the working population should rest easy in the knowledge that, if anything, AI will help. Maria Wilson, a freelance illustrator, disagrees. Since the launch of image-creating AIs like Hotpot and Imagine, she has seen a downturn in commissions. “I illustrate children’s books, and a double-page spread can take anything from a few hours to a week.  Given the right instructions, an AI can do the same thing in under a minute.” Carla Astley from The Freelancer agrees to a certain extent. “The limitations of AI will be overcome in time, and that means it is inevitable there will be fewer jobs. People will still pay a premium for, say, an original piece of copy—one not written by ChatGPT—but how many firms will pay for that?”

[C]
Another concern that crops up, particularly on social media, is our inability to differentiate between what is real and what is not. Almost everyone has heard of deepfakes. Most are created in fun, like King Charles doing the samba, but they can be malicious or amount to propaganda, and we’ve seen how fast misinformation can spread online. When stories become more than just comments on Reddit or Twitter because they involve videos of what looks like the president of Ukraine surrendering to Russia or photographs of a bomb exploding in Washington, they are potentially devastating. Such images, indistinguishable from the real thing, are flooding the internet and are not always labelled ‘AI-generated’ or simply ‘fake’. Washington Post’s recent search of the term “Gaza” on Adobe Stock found several, including emotive images of wounded and frightened children alone in a bombed-out building. Our brains process images 60,000 faster than text—and they create a more lasting impression, no matter if we subsequently learn something isn’t real.

[D]
There is also a danger inherent in any AI in that it is only as smart as the data it learns from. There are two issues here. The first is that the material it learns from is not representative of the entire human race. Take ChatGPT; it learned from books, websites, research papers and so on, written in English, from primarily American sources. It is automatically aligned with a white, male, middle-class perspective because the sources it learned from were produced by white, male, middle-class people. Of the millions of books published since antiquity, how many were written by women?  Or ethnic minorities? Ask ChatGPT a question and its answer will be coloured by its ‘experiences’. And that leads to the second issue. AIs are constantly learning from what we input into them, which is why there has been a recent furore over AI becoming dumber. In the last two years, users claim that the accuracy and complexity of answers on ChatGPT have declined dramatically.

[E]
In response to this and many other ethical concerns, a number of groups have established guidelines for the development of AI. Carla Astley welcomes the move but says that governments have to back up voluntary best practices with legislation. The European Union proposed the world’s first comprehensive AI law in 2023, and although various aspects of the law will be applied from 2024, but it won’t be fully operable until 2030.  The USA hasn’t gone that far, but it has introduced a guide for a society that protects people from the threats posed by AI and “uses technologies in ways that reinforce our highest values”. Yet, as Maria Wilson points out, it isn’t law, and it isn’t global. As AI continues to infiltrate almost every aspect of life at an increasingly rapid rate, a new concern will inevitably arise: can the extremely slow wheels of justice turn fast enough to keep up?

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Questions 37–40

Complete the following summary with NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the text for each gap.

The IELTS General Training Reading Test: A Comprehensive Guide

The General Training IELTS is typically for those aiming to migrate to English-speaking countries and for those who need to demonstrate their English-speaking capabilities at a workplace or school. This article focuses on the General Training Reading test, providing insights into its structure, question types, scoring, and helpful tips for each type of question.

Which exam to choose: General Training or Academic

The choice between General Training and Academic IELTS depends on your objectives.

• The IELTS General Training is designed for people who want to work in an English-speaking country or want to pursue studies in vocational training or secondary education.
• The IELTS Academic is designed for people wish to study at university or college as an undergraduate or postgraduate student or join a professional institution in an English-speaking environment.

Structure and Timing

The General Training Reading test consists of 3 sections, encompassing a total of 40 questions to be completed in 60 minutes. These sections are designed to test a range of reading skills, including gist, main ideas, and details.

• Section 1: Focuses on “social survival” in an English-speaking environment, featuring several short texts related to everyday life, such as advertisements, timetables, and notices.
• Section 2: Examines “workplace survival” skills through texts taken from job descriptions, contracts, and training manuals.
• Section 3: Presents a more complex text on a topic of general interest, often extracted from books, magazines, or newspapers.

Question Types and Tips

The test includes 14 different types of questions, which assess various reading skills. Here’s a brief overview and some strategic tips for each:

1. Matching Headings – Identify the main idea of paragraphs or sections.

• Start by reading the list of headings and paragraphs’ first lines to grasp the key ideas quickly.

2. Multiple Choice – Choose the correct answer from several given options.

• Skim the text to find and verify the specific information.
• You can start by eliminating some of the choices that are considered the most inappropriate.

3. Identifying Information (True/False/Not Given) – Check if the statements are true, false or not mentioned in the text.

• Pay close attention to the facts presented in the text, and look for paraphrases—words or phrases that convey the same meaning as the statements but use different wording.

4. Matching Paragraph Information – Identify which paragraph contains the information given in each statement from a list.

• Scan for key terms and synonyms or paraphrases that match the question. Remember, some paragraphs might be the answer to more than one statement, while others may not contain any relevant information at all.

5. Matching Features – Associate given features with the correct options from the list.

• Focus on specific information to avoid re-reading entire paragraphs.
• Remember the questions may use different words to express the same as the text.
• Highlight key terms and important details to aid in matching accurately.

6. Matching Sentence Endings – Complete sentences about the text by matching the beginning of the sentence with the correct ending from a list.

• Make sure both parts of each sentence are grammatically correct and have a logical cohesion.
• The list of sentences follow the order of the information in the text.

7. Sentence Completion – Fill gaps in a sentence with words from the text.

• Scan the text to quickly locate the specific information. Keep an eye out for synonyms or paraphrases.
• Identify which type of word you will need (non, verb, adjective, etc.)

8. Summary Completion – Fill in gaps to complete a summary of the text using words from the text.

• Scan the text to quickly locate the specific information. Keep an eye out for synonyms or paraphrases.
• Identify which type of word you will need (non, verb, adjective, etc.)

9. Table Completion – Fill in the gaps in a table with words from the text.

• Read the column headings and understand the structure of the table.
• Scan the text to quickly locate the specific information. Look for synonyms or paraphrases.
• Identify which type of word you will need for each gap.

10. Diagram Completion – Label parts of a diagram using words from the text.

• Visualize what the text describes to better understand how to label the diagram.
• Determine the type of words needed for each label (such as nouns for parts of an object or verbs for actions).

11. Short-answer Questions – Respond to questions about specific details found in the text using words directly from the text.

• The questions follow the order of the information in the text.
• Scan the text to quickly locate the specific information. Look for synonyms or paraphrases that may be used instead of the exact words.
• Identify which type of word you will need for each gap.

12. List of Options – Select correct options from a list based on the text.

• Identify the key information within the list of options and scan the text to locate these details.
• Look for synonyms or paraphrases.
• The answers follow the same order as the information in the text.

13. Choose a Title – Select the most appropriate title for the passage from a list of options.

• There will be information about each option in the text, so you must distinguish the main theme or message from other secondary information in the text.
• Pay special attention to the first and last sentences of the passage, as they often contain key points that can help you select the most fitting title.

14. Flow Chart Completion – Complete the missing steps or stages in a flow chart using words from the text.

• Track the sequence and progression of ideas or processes in the text.
• Identify which type of word you will need for each gap.
• Keep in mind that the answers may not always be in the same order as the information appears in the text.

Scoring the IELTS General Training Reading Test

Each correct answer earns you one mark. The total number of correct responses is your raw score, which is then converted into the IELTS band score. It is crucial to attempt all questions as there is no penalty for wrong answers.

IELTS Reading Band Scores

The General Training Reading test scores range from Band 0 (did not attempt the test) to Band 9 (expert user). Here is a brief insight into how raw scores translate into band scores:

This scoring system highlights the importance of preparation and practice. Understanding the structure, familiarizing yourself with the types of questions, and employing effective strategies are crucial for achieving a high score on the IELTS General Training Reading test.

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