Transcript

Chloe: Oh, hi Ivan.

Ivan: Oh, hi Chloe

Chloe: I'm glad I bumped into you because I've been looking at this prospectus about courses at the university. I'm thinking of doing a business studies degree. Isn't that what you're doing? Ivan: Yes, I'm about to start my third year. I think you'd enjoy it. Is there something on the course that you're not sure about? Chloe: Well, you know I've been working for a publisher for the last four years as a production assistant ...

Ivan: That will be really valuable experience because a lot of people go to university straight from school and don't have that kind of background.

Chloe: Yeah, I know and I'm used to dealing with figures and percentages and things, but (21) it's been a while since I've sat down and put my ideas into an essay. I was never that good at it and I'm not sure I can do it now.

Ivan: But you did OK at school, so I'm sure you'll soon get into it again. I was worried about different things when I started, like if I'd be able to use all the computer programs, but you only really need the basics. You have to do a lot of presentations and I thought that would be hard, but we'd actually had such a lot of practice at school it was fine.

Chloe: But did you find writing essays easy?

Ivan: It was OK but (22) I was hopeless at getting them in by the deadline and I was always late for lectures, so I had to work hard at that and I tend to be early now.

Chloe: It's good that you've sorted yourself out before you go and get a job or you might not have it very long! I think the course looks really interesting.

Ivan: It is and it also gave me the chance to spend six months working in a local business last year.

Chloe: That's not so important for me unless I could go abroad to use my foreign languages but that doesn't seem to be on offer, which is a shame. (23) What really appeals to me though, is the idea of being assessed throughout the year, I think that's a much more productive way of learning instead of everything being. decided in an exam at the end.

Ivan: It's good for people like you who are hard-working all year round. You'll be spending all your time in the library. They've just expanded it too.

Chloe: That's good.

Ivan: Well, yes and no. They've made the study area bigger but it means they've taken some of the magazines and periodicals away, so I think it was better as it was. The university's expanding all the time and (24) there are lots of new courses coming next year.

Chloe: Well, that's great news, isn't it? It means the college will have a better reputation as more people will hear about it, so that's good for us.

Ivan: Mm, I agree but they really need to add more lecture rooms as we often have lectures in tiny rooms.

Chloe: Well, you obviously think overall it's a good place to do a degree. I should probably go and have a look round.

Ivan: Well, it's holidays now and there's not much going on there.

Chloe: Oh, so it's probably not worth going in now.

Ivan: But (25) you could email my tutor - I know he'd be happy to answer any questions. I can give you his email address. I looked at quite a lot of other universities and read loads of prospectuses but I thought this one was the best.

-------------------------------

Chloe: I was a bit unsure about all the different subjects you can choose on this course.

Ivan: Well, I can tell you a bit about them. There are some subjects you have to do and some that you can choose. The most interesting course I've done is (26) public relations.

Chloe: From what I've read it doesn't look very demanding - some of it is really just common sense. Ivan: But it will be really useful if you want to go into marketing or advertising.

Chloe: That's true, but I need to find out a bit more about it first before I decide - if it will really help me. It's difficult to tell from the prospectus.

Ivan: But you are interested in marketing?

Chloe: Oh, yes... Ivan: Well, you can choose a (27) marketing course. I wasn't very impressed with that course actually. The tutor didn't make it very interesting.

Chloe: Mm, it's good to put on your CV that you've done a marketing course, though, so that would be a definite for me and maybe I'd get a different tutor. What other courses did you choose?

Ivan: I'm doing (28) taxation as I was thinking of training to be an accountant but I'm not sure now.

Chloe: Oh, that will be a good option for me because I enjoy working with figures. Although I don't want to be an accountant. It'll be good to have an understanding of taxation, especially if I ever run my own business,

Ivan: Then there's the most popular course, which is (29) human resources and a lot of people seem to get jobs in that field.

Chloe: My friend works in human resources and she's really good at it, but I don't think I've got the right personality so I'd give that one a miss. I'm more interested in how businesses actually work - the structure.

Ivan: That's a compulsory course -- the structure of business - but you might find (30) information systems helpful.

Chloe: Is that kind of computer programs?

Ivan: Some of it is, but also databases, project management, and other things.

Chloe: Oh, sounds useful, but I'll have to look at some of the other possibilities first. You know, Ivan, this course sounds as though it would suit me. I'm going to apply.

Ivan: Great! If there's anything else you want to ask me, you've got my number

Chloe: Thanks!

Welcome to the Selmore Public Library which as just been reopened after major refurbishment. This tour will introduce you to the building and its services. At any time you can stop the tour. We enter by the café and our tour begins at the issue desk.

If you stand between the information dest and the issue desk and look at the opposite wall, you will see shelves of book in the left-hand corner. (11) This is where you will find a large number of novels and short stories.  They are arranged alphabetically. If you’re looking for something in particular and it’s not on the shelf you can reserve it. The next area, directly opposite the issue desk, (12) is a section where people can study. The library provides computers for users free of charge on the next floor beside the reference books but this area is for people to use their own laptops. You should ask for the internet passcode at the information desk.

In the right-hand corner of this floor there is a café. A selection of daily newspapers is always available there but you can also take magazines into the café to read while you have a drink. (13) You will find these on the racks to the left of the café and there is a large selection. They are for reference only and cannot be borrowed but you are welcome to photocopy any articles of interest. We ask you fiction or any other books from the shelves into the café.

Next to the café is the exit door leading to the stairs and escalator to the other floors. The largest collection of books in the library is fiction (14)  and the next largest is non-fiction which is in the corner of this floor opposite the café.  These can all be borrowed as opposed to the reference books on the next floor, most of which cannot be taken out of the library – but they can be photocopied. There are several photocopiers available for this purpose downstairs in the basement. To one side of the issue desk is a door leading onto a gallery. This was added to the library as a public space where talks are given once a week on a Saturday by visiting authors of both fiction and non-fiction. (15) It also houses the biography section. There are notices advertising the talks in the study area.

Any books that you want to borrow should be taken to the issue desk. Before we leave this floor I will give you some information about using the library. There are also helpful notices by the information desk.

To join the library and take books out, you need a membership card. Take your passport or identity card, as well as proof of your home address, to the information desk and you will be issued with a card. (16)  After a period of two years, all readers are required to go to the desk with a document that has their name and current address on it so the library can keep up-to-date records of where people are living. There’s no charge for this but any lost cards are charged at £5.

If you can’t find the book you want on the shelves, you can reserve it. If it’s in another library in the city, we can usually get it for you within a week. If someone else has borrowed it, it can take a few weeks. (17) Either way, we notify you by phone or email when the item is available to be picked up.  We will hold it for you for five days.

Books can be borrowed for fourteen days and can be renewed for a further two weeks. Children’s books also have a two-week borrowing period. The same system exists for CD-ROMs and CDs but (18) DVDs, both children’s and adult’s, can only be borrowed for up to seven days. It isn’t possible to renew them. Some reference books can be borrowed but normally only for one day, so 24 hours.

The library opening hours have been changed slightly. Instead of opening late on Wednesday evenings till 8PM, we will be closing at 6, as on other weekdays, (19) but we will close at 7 instead of 5.30 on Saturdays and a new development – we are going to open on Sunday mornings from next month – 9 to 1. We are closed on public holidays and notices are posted in the library about these.

Before you go upstairs, please note that if you are going to the exhibition area on the third floor, large bags are not allowed. (20) There are lockers beside the reference area on the second floor where you can deposit them. If you need change, you can get that from the information desk on the first floor.

Now press ‘pause’ and proceed to the second floor. When you reach the top of the stairs press ‘play’.

Speaker: Good morning. It’s a great pleasure to be here in London and to see so many people interested in working in hotels. We in the International Finest Group of hotels are very proud of our business and we are always on the lookout for quality recruits in every department.

Now, I’m going to outline some of the areas of work where we are currently recruiting and the essential skills or qualifications for them, then I’ll run through our recruitment procedure. OK?

At the moment we’re looking for a number of people for administrative posts in different parts of the world and also some roles which involve a lot of travelling.

One of our main business streams is hosting special events for other businesses. If you have good communication and organizational skills (11) with a good level of fluency in at least once European and one non-European language. I’d suggest you think about becoming part of the team which sets up these events for all our centres. This would mean being based full-time in our London office. The work ranges from setting up small meetings a few days ahead to organizing international conferences two years in advance, so there’s plenty of variety. Some of the conferences we run have as many as a thousand delegates, so it’s quite challenging.

Then there are some posts available for professionals in the catering field. Chefs we can find; it seems this is a popular career choice in many parts of the world as in the UK these days, in spite of the exacting standards, but (12) people to manage catering departments need more than a love of producing quality food. We’re after really energetic and totally efficient young managers, who already have the relevant business qualifications – no training on the job here – and they must share the team’s determination to make everything run smoothly at any tine of the day or night.

Or, if you are the type of person who enjoys a challenge, what about becoming one of our relief housekeepers? You’ll be a good people person, well organized, and supremely flexible. As well as covering UK holidays, maternity and paternity leave, (13) there will be times when you have to fill a key post when someone’s sick, which could be anywhere in our European, Middle Eastern or Far Eastern hotels so you must be prepared to hop on a plane  at five minutes’ notice.

The International Finest brand name attracts visitors from all over the world and on all kinds of business and leisure trips. Our swimming pools and gyms need to be run by people with the highest standards of customer service. You don’t have to be a great athlete, but smart appearance and a pleasant manner are necessary. (14) A diploma in sports science would be the minimum requirement here. Lastly, I’d just like to mention that the main London office has another vacancy. Most bookings come online, especially from the Far East for people coming to Europe. (15) If you have fluency and some keyboard skills in , for example, Spanish, or any Far Eastern languages, either having taken a degree, or preferably from having lived and worked overseas, you might be just the person we’re looking for to deal with email booking and queries in the office here. A flexible attitude to working hours is also important as you may have to come in outside normal office hours.

So that’s an overview of the kind of jobs, now how to get them! First of all, provided you have a UK work permit, you can go online and register an interest in working for us. By return, you’ll receive a unique applicant’s code, which is your personal identification number and which we’ll use in all communications. (16) Along with that you get access to the Human Resources website, where you should make sure you understand the legal terms and conditions which apply to all our employees. That’s also where you can then download (17) the application form – fill it in and send it back along with your CV. You’ll know within 48 hours whether you’re being considered as you get an automated response. Sorry if it’s a bit impersonal, but at least it’s quick. Hopefully, if we like the sound of you, there will be in that automated response (18) a list of times for an initial interview which will take place by telephone during the following week. You confirm by email which of the time slots will suit you. Provided the interview is satisfactory, at that point we’ll ask for (19) any evidence of qualifications required, which might be your degree or diploma certificate or so on, which you have to send certified copies of, and we contact your referees. The last thing you have to do is you come along and have a look round the International Finest Group head office, get to know some of our team in Human Resources face to face, and (20) participate in a one-day recruitment seminar, which involves a number of group and individual activities along with other potential employees.

Then, with luck, we’ll offer you a job! So, I hope you like the sound of joining our organization.

This morning I’m going to describe for you a few of the kinds of experiments that have been used to investigate the sense of taste, which is now recognized as being a far more complex and important area of neurological science than was previously believed by most people. The results of some of these experiments can be quite fun and I shall suggest that you may want to choose one or two to try out in groups before having a go at designing a new experimental procedure of your own and trying to pinpoint the cause of your findings.

The first one concerns a marketing exercise by a soft drinks company. (31) The green colour of some cans was altered by the addition of yellow, so they were a brighter green. Then test subjects were asked what they thought about the flavor of the drink in the new-style cans, and (32) they stated that there was more lime in the drink if it was in the ones with the new colour. This was because the brain picks up cues from the way the product is presented, as well as the product itself, which trigger taste sensations. Before food was packaged, humans used colour to gauge the ripeness of fruit, for example.

Next there’s the old problem with chewing gum. Everyone knows that after a few minutes’ chewing it loses its minty flavor. However, (33) if you ask people to chew up to the point where it becomes tasteless, and then ask them to eat a little sugar and continue chewing, to most people’s surprise, what happens is that (34) the original mintiness actually returns because it is the sweetness which is needed to make the mintiness perceptible. So combinations of flavours can be significant, as the brain needs one of them in order to recognize the other.

Another experiment demonstrates something we’ve all done. Drink half a fizzy drink straight from the fridge and then leave it at room temperature for a while. Take a sip and you may well decide you don’t like it. (35) The warm drink is too sweet to be refreshing. So put the rest back in the fridge until it’s chilled again. Now try it. Much better. Of course the sweetness doesn’t change, it is our perception, because how sweet it tastes depends on the temperature. The extent to which the drink is sweetened is less evident if the drink has been cooled.

Another interesting result has been derived from experiments with sound. (36) One of these involved eating crisps. Subjects were put into soundproof rooms and given batches of crisps to eat. As they ate, the sound of crunching which they made as they ate the crisps was played back to them. This was adjusted so that they sometimes heard the crunching as louder, or, at other times, more high-frequency sounds were audible in the sound feedback that accompanied their eating. (37) Fascinatingly, if the sound level was louder or higher frequency they reported that the crisps were actually fresher. Of course, the crisps were in fact the same every time! So, it was clear that the level and quality of what they were hearing was influencing their taste perceptions.

So, we’ve looked briefly at colour, at complementary flavours, at temperature and sound. If seems that all the senses are working together here, but what about the sense of touch? A number of experiments have been done in this area. If you take, for instance, cheese sauce and prepare different versions, some thicker and some thinner, but without any alteration in the strength of flavour, what do you think the subjects perceive? Yup, if the sauce is thicker, they’ll say the cheesy flavor is less strong. It was clear that the thing (38) that was influencing the subjects’ judgement about the flavour of the sauces was the texture of each one. Now, this result is important for dietitians as well as marketing executives.

Lastly, another variation on the two flavours theme. This concerns the capacity of the brain for bridging a sensory gap. (39) The subjects in this experiment stuck out their tongues so that the testers could drip two liquids onto them simultaneously, one strawberry flavoured and one sugar flavoured. The testers then took away each flavour in turn. When the sweetness was taken away, the subjects reported they could hardly taste anything, (40) but they continued to think they could taste strawberry even after it was taken away! So that taste gap was filled.

Well, that’s just a quick look at some of the examples in the current literature. The references will be in the handout you’ll get at the end of the session. Now let’s see about trying a few of them for ourselves.

Student: First, I would like to tell you how the Argus computerized photography system has helped marine researchers. Then I shall talk a bit about sand collecting.

Well, Argus is the system Doctor Rob Holman developed when he was working at a research pier on the coast of North Carolina about 20 years ago.

This pier stretches out over the water, and it’s the longest research pier in the world, with an observation tower on the end of it. The researchers there make precise measurements of how the sand moves about under the waves. (31) This research is critical to the study of beach erosion in places where the coastline is being worn away.

The Argus system helps to solve the difficulties encountered by these researchers. (32)  The system correlates the data from under the water with what Dr Holman gets from his fixed camera, which is mounted above the water on the pier  and uses time-lapse photography.

Some of Doctor Holman’s results have changed the way people understand how sand moves. To quote S. Jeffress Williams, a coastal geologist with the United States Geological Survey, the system is ‘a critical piece of new technology’ and ‘The (33) Argus system allows us to quantity and document visually the changes to the coast on a variety of different time frames. A lot ot these take place when there is a storm or at other times when it is difficult to have people out on the beach making observations and taking measurements.’

Up to now Argus installations have been installed in places in Oregon, California, Hawaii, England, the Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, Spain, Italy and Brazil, as well as in North Carolina.

Now I’d like to introduce Dr Holman’s sand collection. He started collecting sand in the 1980s, and he still collects it now, even though he has around a thousand samples. They come from his travels and from geologists and amateurs all over the world – and (34) the collection includes sand from each continent, including Antarctica.

People send him sand in envelopes, plastic bags, paper towels and all sorts! Each is stored in a glass jar, which Dr Holman labels by latitude and longitude of its origin, as well as he can work them out – sometimes the information is a bit sketchy!

Anyway, (35) it’s mainly geology students at the university who study his collection, and they can learn a lot from it.

For instance, one set of tubes displays sand from the East Coast of the US. So you can see that the sand gets lighter and finer from north to south. By the time a grain of sand eventually washes up on a beach in Florida (36) at the southern and of that journey, it has been battered by waves for a long time so the grains are fine and rounded because most of the time sand is not stationary on the beach.

OK, so if you’d like to collect sand and maybe even send some to Dr Holman, How should you go about it? Well, the list of equipment is very short and easy to find, but you should keep a supply when you’re travelling, as you never know when you’ll come across an interesting sand sample.

(37) One really handy thing for digging sand, especially if it’s hard or frozen, is a spoon, it’s perfect for that. If you’re travelling by air it’ll have to be plastic, but metal is preferable, as plastic tends to break. You need something to put the samples in that is damp-proof and easy to carry. You can just use plastic bags, (38) but you need to record the location and date on the bag, so you must also have a permanent marker with you,  because you can never assume you will remember where you gathered a sample from later on and you don’t want it to rub off before you get home.

And that’s about all you need in the field to collect sand. When you get home, your samples should be logged in a notebook or computer. You need to note the location and be really specific as to exactly whereabouts on the beach you gathered your sample – low tide mark, under cliff area, etc.

Then, you store your sample. You want to keep everything in good condition and avoid contamination. So first you make absolutely sure that each sample is perfectly dry. You don’t need any complicated apparatus for this, (39) you can just air it out on layers of newspaper, which is suitably absorbent. Most people find that’s the best way.

Then, lastly, but this is really important, before there can be any chance of confusing this latest sample with another, you put it in a clean small bag or a jar, and (40) you must stick an identification label on straight away. Some people put one inside as well in case the outer label falls off, but that’s up to you.

Well, that’s about all you need to know to get started as a sand collector.

Any questions?

Lecturer: During today’s lecture in this series about the history of popular music, I’m going to look at the different stages the electric guitar went through before we ended up with the instrument we know so well today.

The driving force behind the invention of the electric guitar was simply the search for a louder sound. In the late 1890s Orville Gibson, founder of the Gibson Mandolin-Guitar Manufacturing Company. (31) designed a guitar with an arched or curved top, as is found on a violin. This made it both stronger and louder than earlier designs but it was still hard to hear amongst other louder instruments.

During the 1920s with the beginnings of big-band music, commercial radio and the rise of the recording industry, the need to increase the volume of the guitar became even more important. Around 1925 John Dopyera came up with a solution. He designed a guitar, known as ‘The National Guitar’, with a metal body which had metal resonating cones built into the top. (32) It produced a brash tone which became popular with guitarists who played blues but was unsuitable for many other types of music.

Another way of increasing the volume was thought of in the 1930s. The C. F. Martin Company became known for its ‘Dreadnought’, (33) a large flat-top acoustic guitar that used steel strings instead of the traditional gut ones. Its was widely imitated by other makers.

These mechanical fixes helped, but only up to a point. So guitarists began to look at the possibilities offered by the new field of electronic amplification. What guitar players needed was a way to separate the guitar’s sound and boost it in isolation from the rest of a band or the surroundings.

Guitar makers and players began experimenting with electrical pickups which are the main means of amplification used today. The first successful one was invented in 1931 by George Beauchamp. (34) He introduced to the market a guitar known as ‘The Frying Pan’ because the playing area consisted of a small round disk. The guitar was hollow and was made aluminum and steel. (35) He amplified the sound by using a pair of horseshoe-shaped magnets. It was the first commercially successful electric guitar.

So by the mid-1930s, an entirely new kind of sound was born. Yet along with its benefits, the new technology brought problems. The traditional hollow body of a guitar caused distortion and feedback when combined with electromagnetic pickups. Musicians and manufacturers realized that a new kind of guitar should be designed from scratch with amplification in mind.

In 1935, Adolph Rickenbaker produced a guitar which took his name – ‘The Rickenbaker Electro Spanish’. (36) It was the first guitar produced in plastic, which, because of its weight, vibrated less readily than wood. It eliminated the problems of earlier versions which were plagued by acoustic feedback. ‘The Electro Spanish’ had its own problems, however, because it was very heavy, smaller than other guitars of the period, and was quite awkward to play. Developments continued and in 1941 Les Paul made a guitar which he called ‘The Log’, and true to its name, (37) it was totally solid. All previous guitars had been hollow or partly hollow. It looked slightly strange but the next step had been made towards the modern electric guitar.

The first guitar successfully produced in large numbers was made in 1950 by Leo Fender. His Spanish-style electric guitar, known as a ‘Fender Broadcaster’, had a bolt-on neck, and was intitially criticized by competitions as being very simple and lacking in craftmanship. Yet it was immediately successful and (38) was particularly suited to mass production, spurring other guitar companies to follow Fender’s lead.

In 1951 Leo Fender revolutionized the music world yet again when he produced an electric bass guitar. This was the first commercially successful bass model to be played like a guitar. It was easier for players to hit an exact note: (39) that’s why it was called ‘The Precision’. Although there had already been electric standup basses, this was much more portable. It is now standard in the line-up of any rock ban and some historians suggest that entire genres of music, such as reggae and funk, could not exist without it.

In 1952 the Gibson company became Fender’s first major competitor when Ted McCarty created ‘The Gibson Les Paul’ guitar. It was distinctive because (40) it was coloured gold. The reason for this was to disguise the face that it was made from two different instrument by introducing ‘The Fender Stratocaster’. It is easily identified by its double cutaway design and three pickups. This model may be the most influential electric guitar ever produced. The modern guitar as we know it was here to stay.

Lecturer: Thank you for coming to this series of talks. Before I talk in detail about the experiments and innovations of the British ceramicists, I’d like to give you a summary of the social and manufacturing background in which they lived and worked. So, we’re talking about England, or more specifically, the region known as ‘TheMidlands’, and we need to go back, mainly to the eighteenth century and, briefly, even earlier, to put it in a global context.

Now, at that period (31) the majority of the population, whatever their station in life, as you might say, were dependent for their living, in one way or another, not on the geographical location of where they lived, but on the physical characteristics of the actual land they lived on. This is true, whether we’re talking about the aristocracy, the owners of great estates, who incidentally had no snobbery about the concept of making money from all the reserves of coal, or timber, or stone on their rolling acres, or the farmers making a fat living from the rich soils. And besides these groups, and the less affluent ones, (32) the deposits of iron ore and lead, the limestone and flint and the brown and yellow clays also sustained the numerous industries in the area.

It’s important to recognize that it was already an industrial region, and had been so for centuries. There were many Midland trades, some of them so indigenous, some of them not. For example, (33) there were immigrants from France who came as early as the late sixteenth century and they were producers of glass. A century later, there is plenty of evidence that the variety of trades was enormous: there was brewing in Burton-on-Trent; silk-weaving and ribbon-making near Coventry; framework knitting around Nottingham. And of course, (34) in Cheshire men dug the salt, as we still do nowadays even, which in that era was sent downriver to the estuary of the Mersey.

Now, among these well-established trades, one the oldest of the local crafts was pottery. As you will probably be aware, ceramics has always been a mix of science, design and skill, and a good potter is in a sense and experimental chemist, trying out new mixes and glazes, and needing to be alert to the impact of changes of temperature on different types of clay. For two hundred years, up to the time we are concerned with, (35) potters had been making butterpots and pitchers and patterned plates, using the clay which was plentiful in the area where they lived – in a handful of North Staffordshire villages dotted along the low hills.

Now I want to explain a little about the industrial processes which had preceded the great breakthrough in Germany in 1708. That’s when the formula for porcelain was discovered, a secret that had been held in China for a thousand years. In the Midlands, in England, as elsewhere, there had basically been two kinds of pottery. The first was known, is still known, as ‘earthenware’.

Now this was a bit rough and ready, but it was deservedly popular for several reasons. To start with, it was relatively cheap, so it could be used by most households. This was because (36) it could be made from local clay without any complicated processing or added materials. (37) From the potter’s point of view there was another reason for its cheapness. This was that it could be fired in simple ovens, or kilns, and at relatively low temperatures, so he didn’t have to spend so much money on fuel to achieve the necessary heat. On the other hand, after one firing in the kiln, the problem with earthenware was that it remained porous so had limited usefulness. So for most purposes (38) it had to go back in the kiln for a second firing before it became waterproof.

And another thing was that it was extremely breakable – I mean, before it had even been sold. I suppose the potter wouldn’t have minded so much if people just had to keep coming back for more every time they broke a jug or whatever! – but it was very inconvenient because it meant there was a lot of (39) wastage in the course of the manufacturing process.

Anyway, for all these reasons, if people could afford it, and that would be all but the very poor, they would buy (40) stoneware, a much tougher product.

Now, for this, the potter used a slightly more expensive raw material, which was made by combining clay and this mixture was fired at a far higher heat, with the result that the ingredients vitrified, that is to say, in effect the whole thing became glassy and because of this it was non-porous, and naturally, this was regarded as a great advance.

Well, that’s the situation in the eighteenth century. Are there any questions at this stage? OK. So, now we can go on to look at the age of innovation.

I work for the National Weather Service and as part of your course on weather patterns, I've been asked to talk to you about how we predict the weather. We're so used to switching on our TVs and getting an up-to-date weather forecast at any time of day or night that we probably forget that this level of sophistication has only been achieved in the last few decades and weather forecasting is actually an ancient art. So I want to start by looking back into history.

 The earliest weather forecasts appeared in the 1500s in almanacs, which were lists of information produced every year. (31) Their predictions relied heavily on making links between the weather and where the planets were in the sky on certain days. In addition, predictions were often based on information like if the fourth night after a new moon was clear, good weather was expected to follow.

But once basic weather instruments were invented, things slowly started to change. (32) In the mid-fifteenth century, a man called Nicholas Cusa, a German mathematician, designed a hygrometer which told people how much humidity there was in the air. To do this, Cusa put some sheep's wool on a set of scales and then monitored the change in the wool's weight according to the air conditions. A piece of equipment we all know and use is the thermometer. (33) Changes in temperature couldn't really be measured until the Italian Galileo Galilei invented his thermometer in 1593. It wasn't like a modern-day thermometer because it had water inside it instead of mercury. In fact, it wasn't until 1714 that Gabriel Fahrenheit invented the first mercury thermometer. In 1643 another Italian called Evangelista Torricelli invented the first barometer which measured atmospheric pressure. This was another big step forward in more accurate weather predicting.

As time went on, during the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, all these meteorological instruments were improved and developed and people in different countries began to record measurements relating to their local weather. However, (34) in those days it was very difficult to send records from one part of the world to another so it wasn't possible for them to share their information until the electric telegraph became more widespread. This meant that weather observations could be sent on a regular basis to and from different countries. By the 1860s, therefore, weather forecasts were becoming more common and accurate because they were based on observations taken at the same time over a wide area. (35) In 1863, France started publishing weather maps each day. This hadn't been done before, and other nations soon followed. So that was the start of national weather forecasting and I'll now tell you how we at the National Weather Centre get the information we need to produce a forecast.

Even today, one of the most important methods we use is observations which tell us what the weather is doing right now. Observation reports are sent automatically from equipment at a number of weather stations in different parts of the country, (36) They are nearly all based at airports although a few are in urban centres. The equipment senses temperature, humidity, pressure and wind speed direction.

Meteorologists also rely really heavily on satellites which send images to our computer screens. What we see on our screens is bright colours. (37) Orange represents dry air and bright blue shows moisture levels in the atmosphere. The satellites are located 22,000 miles above the surface of the Earth and it's amazing that despite that distance (38) it's possible for us to make out an individual cloud and follow it as it moves across the landscape.

In addition to collecting data from the ground, we need to know what's happening in the upper levels of the atmosphere. So a couple of times a day from many sites across the country, we send radiosondes into the air. (39) A radiosonde is a box containing a package of equipment and it hangs from a balloon which is filled. with gas. Data is transmitted back to the weather station. Finally, radar. (40) This was first used over 150 years ago and still. is. New advances are being made all the time and it is one method for detecting and monitoring the progress of hurricanes, Crucial information is shown by different colours representing speed and direction. Radar is also used by aircraft, of course. All this information from different sources is put into computer models which are like massive computer programs. Sometimes they all give us the same story and sometimes we have to use our own experience to decide which is showing the most accurate forecast which we then pass on to you. So I hope next time you watch the weather forecast, you'll think about how we meteorologists spend our time. And maybe I've persuaded some of you to study meteorology in more depth.

Good morning, everybody. Today I’m going to talk about one of the most terrible wars of the twentieth century. Although it took place mainly in Europe, it involved countries from all over the world. I’m talking, of course, about the First World War, from 1914 to 1918, which resulted in the death of about ten million military personnel. Despite the enormous human cost, the war did have some positive consequences. In fact, it was precisely because of the nature and scale of the horrors of the battlefield that many important medical advances were made, as new equipment and techniques had to be developed quickly to cope with the huge number of injuries.

As I said, the scale of the First World War was huge. New weapons were used that were designed to kill on an industrial scale, such as machine guns, tanks and poison gases. These produced brutal results: many deaths and about twice as many injuries. Those injured suffered very severe wounds and this pushed the medical establishment to build on recent discoveries and to come up with solutions for the new problems faced by doctors. I’m going to tell you about a few of these.

You probably know that X-rays were discovered in 1895, and were developed for limited medical use in the following year. But their use became much more widespread during the war, when they helped detect fragments of bombs and bullets buried in tissue. They allowed doctors to extract these elements, which would otherwise have caused serious infections. Stretchers for carrying injured people had also been in use before the war, but the development of rescuing the wounded from the battlefield, by sending in stretcher-bearers to bring them back as quickly as possible, was completely new. The modern concept of a paramedic, who is able to apply first aid in the field, also comes from this time.

Blood transfusion was in its early days at the time of the Great War. It was done person-to-person, that is, with a tube transferring blood from one person to another. This was extremely impractical and carried a very high risk. The rigours of the war demanded a better solution and by 1917 indirect transfusion had been developed. It was possible to store blood on ice for up to 26 days and deal much better with battle injuries. For many, this was the most significant medical breakthrough of the war.

Teacher: Good afternoon. So we’re fast approaching exam season and I can already see a lot of tired faces here in front of me. Well, today we are lucky enough to have Professor Manson from the University of Denton talk to us about how sleep can help us pass those all-important exams. So without any further ado, I’d like you to give a big round of applause and stay wide awake for Professor Denton.

Professor: Good afternoon. Looking around this room now takes me back to when I was your age and life seemed to be a never-ending chain of exams and assignments. At that time, organisation was not my forte and too often I found myself up all hours of the night before an exam cramming every last piece of information I could in an attempt to remember something. Does that sound familiar to any of you? Can I just see a show of hands how many of you this term have had no more than 3 or 4 hours' sleep before an exam? OK, so that’s a clear majority and it has to be said that last-minute revision can do wonders for the short-term memory, but what is, in fact, even more beneficial is a good night’s sleep.

So, I’d like to explain to you now, especially you all-night crammers, the link between sleep and memory and how a good night’s kip can improve your exam results. Now, could everyone take a minute to work out, on average, how many hours' sleep they get every night. Can I see a show of hands for more than 10 hours? OK, none of you, how about between 8 and 10 hours? A handful of you. OK, so what about between 6 and 8 hours? Right, that’s a popular option. And any of you fewer than 6 hours? Mmm … OK, so you’re the guys we most need to worry about.

According to the National Sleep Foundation in Washington, newborn babies need anything between 14 and 17 hours' sleep and this amount gradually decreases the older we get until as adults we need around 7 or 8 hours sleep, but … you’ll be interested to know that the 14 to 17 age group should be aiming for 8 to 10 hours' sleep a night. So you can already see that most of us are not getting enough sleep, and this is something we need to think about.

Sleep is essential. The human body simply can’t survive without it. End of story. While we’re asleep, the body checks that all our vital functions such as growth, circulatory systems and our immune system are in good working order. And while we’re snoring away, our brains are very active restructuring information we’ve collected during the day and consolidating memories.

So let me explain memory consolidation. Memory consolidation is what happens when information is moved from our short-term memory to our long-term memory with the help of a major part of the brain called the hippocampus. This is it folks … this is the BIG moment when all of those facts and figures that you have crammed into your short-term memory are processed and consolidated in your long-term memory.

However, as you’re probably aware, we don’t always remember everything. One reason we remember certain things better than others relates to the environment or conditions we were in when we originally made the memories. What experts have discovered is, the more emotions that are activated when we make a memory, the more likely we are to consolidate that memory. So, for example, the more interesting or fun you find a biology lesson, the more chance there is of you remembering information from it … OK, teachers? And not only that … we actually need to review information again and again after certain periods of time to help the consolidation process, which is why well-planned exam revision timetables are far more effective in the long term than short-term cramming the night before.