Section 4

When we took at theories of education and learning we see a constant shifting of views as established theories are questioned and refined or even replaced, and we can see this very clearly in the way that attitudes towards bilingualism have changed.

Let’s start with a definition of bilingualism, and for our purposes today, we can say it's the ability to communicate with the same degree of proficiency in at least two languages. Now, in practical terms this might seem like a good thing - something we'd all like to be able to do. However, early research done with children in the USA in fact suggested that being bilingual interfered in some way with learning and with the development of their mental processes, and so in those days bilingualism was regarded as something to be avoided, and parents were encouraged to bring their children up as monolingual - just speaking one language, But this research, which took place in the early part of the twentieth century is now regarded as unsound for various reasons, mainly because it didn't take into account other factors such as the children's social and economicbackgrounds

Now, in our last lecture we were looking at some of the research that's been done into the way children learn, into their cognitive development, and in fact we believe now that the relationship between bilingualism and cognitive development is actually a positive one, it turns out that cognitive skills such as problem solving, which don't seem at first glance to have anything to do with how many languages you speak, are better among bilingual children than monolingual ones.

And quite recently there's been some very interesting work done by Ellen Bialystok at York University' in Canada, she's been doing various studies on the effects of bilingualism and her findings provide some evidence that they might apply to adults as well, they’re not just restricted to children.

So how do you go about investigating something like this? Well, Dr Bialystok used groups of monolingual and bilingual subjects, aged from 30 right up to 88 for one experiment, she used a computer program which displayed either a red or a blue square on the screen. The coloured square could come up on either the left-hand or the right- hand side of the screen. If the square was blue, the subject had to press the left 'shift' key on the keyboard and if the square was red they had to press the right shift key. So they didn't have to react at all to the actual position of the square on the screen, just to the colour they saw. And she measured the subjects' reaction times by recording how long it took them to press the shift key. and how often they got it right.

What she was particularly interested in was whether it took the subject longer to react when a square lit up on one side of the screen - say the left, and the subject had to press the shift key on the right band side. She'd expected that it would take more processing time than if a square lit up on the left and the candidates had to press a left key.

This was because of a phenomenon known as the 'Simon effect', where, basically the brain gets a bit confused because of conflicting demands being made on it - in this case seeing something on the right, and having to react on the left and this causes a person's reaction times to slow down.

The results of the experiment showed that the bilingual subjects responded more quickly than the monolingual ones. That was true both when the squares were on the 'correct' side of the screen, so to speak, and - even more so - when they were not. So, bilingual people were better able to deal with the Simon effect than the monolingual ones.

So, what's the explanation for this? Well, the result of the experiment suggests that bilingual people are better at ignoring information which is irrelevant to the task in hand and just concentrating on what's important. One suggestion given by Dr Bialystok was that it might be because someone who speaks two languages can suppress the activity of parts of the brain when it isn't needed in particular, the part that processes whichever language isn’t being used at that particular time.

Well, she Then went on to investigate that with a second experiment, but again the bilingual group performed better, and what was particularly interesting, and this is I think why the experiments have received so much publicity, is that in all cases, the performance gap between monolingual and bilinguals actually increased with age - which suggests that bilingualism protects the mind against decline, so in some way the life-long experience of managing two languages may prevent some of the negative effects of aging. So that’s a very different story from the early research.

So what are the implications of this for education . .

Section 2

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to your very own tour of the British Library on this lovely afternoon. My name is Tony Walters and I'm your guide for today. Could I please see your tickets for the guided tour?

I'd also like to remind you that any tickets bought today do not include a visit to the reading rooms. I’m afraid we don’t do visits on Fridays - or any weekday during working hours, so as not to disturb the readers. But if you do want to see those rooms, the only day there are tours is on Sundays. So, I don't want anyone to be disappointed about that today. OK? thank you.Right. We'll start with a brief introduction As many ol you know, this is the United Kingdom's National Library and you can see that this is a magnificent modern building. It was first designed by Sir Colin St John Wilson in 1977, and inaugurated by Her Majesty the Queen more than twenty years later, in 1998.

As you can see. the size is immense and the basements alone have 300 kilometres of shelving - and that's enough to hold about 12 million books. The total floor space here is 100,000 square metres and, as I'll show you, the library houses a huge range of facilities and exhibition spaces, and it has a thousand staff members based here in the building - so, you can appreciate the scale of our operation.

In fact, this was the biggest publicly-funded building constructed in the United Kingdom last century. It is still funded by the government as a national institution, ot course, and it houses one of the most important collections in the world. The different items come from every continent and span almost 3000 years.

The library isn't a public library, though you can't just come in and join and borrow any of the books. Access to the collections is limited to those involved in carrying out research, so it's really a huge reference library for that purpose, and anyone who wants to consult any materials that are kept here can formally apply to use the library reading rooms.

Right, well, here we are, standing at the Meeting Point on the lower ground floor just to the right of the Main Entrance. I've given you all a plan of the building so that we can orientate ourselves and get an idea of where we'll be going. Now outside the Main Entrance you'll see the wide Piazza with the stunning sculpture of Newton.

The sculptor was Paolozzi, but it's based on the famous image by William Blake - and it’s definitely worth a closer look. On the other side ot the Piazza from the statue is the Conference Centre, which is used for all kinds of international conventions we'll take a quick look inside at the end of our tour.

Looking ahead of us now, you'll see that we're standing opposite the staircase down to the basement where you'll find the cloakroom, and to the left of that, we have the information desk where you can find out about any current exhibitions, the times of the tours and anything you need to know - if you don't have a tour guide. As you can see, on this lower ground floor we also have a bookshopthat's the area over to the left of the main entrance. You'll be free to browse there when we get back to the ground floor.

Now, opposite the main entrance on this floor we have the open stairs leading up to the upper ground floor. And at the top of them, in the middle of the upper ground floor, you can see a kind of glass-sided tower that rises all the way up through the ceiling and up to the first floor. This is called the King's Library, it's really the heart of the building, it was built to house the collection that was presented to the nation in 1823 by the King. You can see it from every floor above ground. When we go up there, you'll find the library's Treasures Gallery on the left. Can you find it on your plan? That's the exciting one, so we'll be visiting that first but we'll also take a look at the stamp display situated behind it, on the way to the cafe - a lot of people miss that. The Cafeteria runs along the back of the floor and, in the right hand corner, you’ll find the lifts and toilets ... ha, always good to locate them. The other main area on that floor is the Public Access Catalogue section and I’ll show you how that operates when we get up there ...

Section 1

Cindy:     Hello, Brindall's Estate Agents here. How may I help you?

Martin:     Oh, good morning, I’m ringing to see what flats you have for rentat the moment.

Cindy:     Right. Can I start by just taking your name Mr em...

Martin:     Hill, Martin Hill

Cindy:     Right, and are you looking for a flat for yourself or ... em ... a family perhaps?

Martin:     Well it's for three of us myself and two friends - we're going to share together.

Cindy:     I see . . erm, what about employment - are you all students?

Martin:     Oh no, we’ve all got full time jobs - two of us work in the Central Bank, that's Chris and me and Phil that’s the other one is working for Hallam cars, you know, at the factory about two miles out of town?

Cindy:     I'll put you down as young professionals, then and I suppose you'll be looking for somewhere with three bedrooms?

Martin:     Yeah - at least three. But actually, we'd rather have a fourth room as well if we can afford it - for friends staying over and stuff

Cindy:     Is that with a living room to share? Plus kitchen and bathroom?

Martin:     Yeah, that sounds good But we must have a bathroom with a shower. We don't mind about having a bath, but the shower's crucial.

Cindy:     OK, I'll just key that in ... Arid, are you interested in any particular area?

Martin:     Well the city centre would be good for me and Chris, so that's our first preference ... but we'd consider anything in the west suburbs as well really - actually for Phil that'd be better, but he knows he's outnumbered. But we aren't interested in the north or the east of the city.

Cindy:     OK, I'm just getting up all the flats on our books.

Cindy:     Just looking at this list here, I’m afraid there are only two that might interest you ... do you want the details?

Martin:     OK, let me just grab a pen and some paper, fire away!

Cindy:     This first one I'm looking at is in Bridge Street - and very dose to the bus station. It's not often that flats in that area come up for rent. This one’s got three bedrooms, a bathroom and kitchen, of course ... and a very big living room That sounds a good size for you.

Martin:     Mmmm . So, what about the rent? How much is it a month?

Cindy:     The good news is that it's only four hundred and fifty pounds a month. Rents in that area usually reach up to six fifty a month, but the landlord obviously wants to get a tenant quickly.

Martin:     Yeah, it sounds like a bit of a bargain. What about transport for Phil?

Cindy:     Well, there'll be plenty of buses so no problem for him to use public transport... or... but unfortunately there isn't a shower in the flat, and that location is likely to be noisy, of course ...

Martin:     OK - what about the other place?

Cindy:     Let's see ... oh yes. well this one is in a really nice location - on Hills Avenue. I'm sure you know it. This looks like something a bit special It's got four big bedrooms and erm, there's a big living room and ... oh. this will be good for you a dining room. It sounds enormous, doesn't it?

Martin:     Yeah, it sounds great!

Cindy:     That whole area's being developed, and the flat's very modern, which I'm sure you'll like. It’s got good facilities, including your shower. And of course it's going to be quiet, especially compared with the other place.

Martin:     Better and better but I'll bet it's expensive, especially if it's in that trendy area beside the park.

Cindy:     Hmm, I'm afraid so. They're asking £800 a month for it.

Martin:     Wow it sounds a lot more than we can afford.

Cindy:     Well maybe you could get somebody else to move in too? I'll tell you what, give me your address and I can send you all the details and photos and you can see whether these two are worth a visit.

Martin:     Thanks, that would be really helpful my address

Section 4

Hello, everybody, and welcome to the sixth of our Ecology evening classes. Nice to see you all again. As you know from the programme, today I want to talk to you about some research that is pushing back the frontiers of the whole field ol ecology. And this research is being carried out in the remoter regions of our planet .. places where the environment is harsh and until recently it was thought that the conditions couldn't sustain life of any kind. But, life forms are being found and these have been grouped into what is now known as extremophiles that is, organisms that can survive in the most extreme environments. And these discoveries may be setting a huge challenge for the scientists of the future, as you'll see in a minute.

Now, the particular research I want to tell you about was carried out in Antarctica one of the coldest and driest places on Earth. But a multinational team of researchers - from the US, Canada and New Zealand - recently discovered colonies of microbes in the soil there, where no one thought it was possible. Interestingly enough, some of the colonies were identified as a type of fungus called Beauvena Bassiana a fungus that lives on insects. But where are the insects in these utterly empty regions of Antarctica? The researchers concluded that this was clear evidence that these colonies were certainly not new arrivals they might've been there for centuries, or even millennia possibly even since the last Ice Age'. Can you imagine their excitement?

Now, some types of microbes had previously been found living just a few millimetres under the surface of rocks porous, Antarctic rocks, but this was the first time that living colonies had been found surviving - erm relatively deeply in the soil itself, several centimetres down in fact.

So, the big question is: how can these colonies survive there? Well, we know that the organisms living very near the rock surface can still be warmed by the sun, so they can survive in their own microclimate ... and this keeps them from freezing during the day But this isn't the case for the colonies that are hidden under the soil. 

In their research paper, this team suggested that the very high amounts of salt in the soil might be the clue because this is what is preventing essential water from freezing.

The team found that the salt concentration increased the deeper down they went in the soil But while they had expected the number of organisms to be fewer down there, they actually found the opposite. In soil that had as much as 3000 parts of salt per million, relatively high numbers ol microbes were present - which seems incredible! But the point is that at those levels of salt, the temperature could drop to minus 56 degrees before frost would cause any damage to the organisms

This relationship between microbes and salt at temperatures way below the normal freezing point of water - is a really significant breakthrough As you all know, life is dependent on the availability of water in liquid form, and the role of salt al very low temperatures could be the key to survival in these kinds of conditions. Now the process at work here is called supercooling - and that's usually written as one word but it isn’t really understood as yet, so, there's a lot more for researchers to work on However, the fact that this process occurs naturally in Antarctica, may suggest that it might occur in other places with similar conditions, including on our neighbouring planet, Mars. So, you can start to see the wider implications of this kind of research.

In short, it appears to support the growing belief that extraterrestrial life might be able to survive the dry, cold conditions on other planets alter all. Not only does this research produce evidence that life is possible there, it’s also informing scientists of the locationswhere it might be found. So all of this might have great significance for future unmanned space missions.

One specialist on Mars confirms the importance …

Section 3

Olivia:     Hi, Joey. How are you doing?  I heard you were sick.

Joey:     Oh, hi, Olivia. Yeah, I had a virus last week, and I missed a whole pile of lectures, like the first one on the Great Books in Literature where Dr Castle gave us all the information about the semester project.

Olivia:     i can give you copies ot the handouts, I've got them right here.

Joey:     That’s OK. I already collected the handouts but I'm not very clear about all the details... I know we each have to choose an individual author ... I think I'm going to do Carlos Castenada ... I'm really interested in South American literature.

Olivia:     Have you checked he's on the list that Dr Castle gave us? We can't just choose anyone.

Joey:     Yeah. I checked, it's OK Who did you choose?

Olivia:     Well, l was thinking of choosing Ernest Hemingway, but then I thought no, I'll do a British author not an American one, so I chose Emily Bronte.

Joey:     OK .. and first of all it says we have to read a biography of our author I guess it's OK if we just look up information about him on the Internet?

Olivia:     No, it's got to be a full-length book I think the minimum length's 250 pages . there's a list of biographies, didn't you get that?

Joey:     Oh right I didn't realise we had to stick with that. So what do we have to do when we've read the biography?

Olivia:     Well, then we have to choose one work by the writer .. again it's got to be something quite long, we can't just read a short story.

Joey:     But I guess a collection of short stories would be OK?

Olivia:     Yes, or even a collection of poems, they said, but I think most people are doing novels. I'm going to do Wuthenng Heights, I've read it before but I really want to read it again now I've found out more about the writer

Joey:     And then the video . . we have to make a short video about our author and about the book. How long has it got to be?

Olivia:     A minute

Joey:     What? Like, sixty seconds? And we gotta give all the important information about their life and the book we choose ...

Olivia:     Well you can't do everything I wrote it down somewhere ... yes, Dr Castle said we had to ’find or write a short passage that helps to explain the author's passion for writing, why they're a writer' So, we can back this up with reference to important events in the writer's life if they’re relevant, but it’s up to us really. The video's meant to portray the essence of the writer's life and the piece of writing we choose.

Joey:     So when we read the biography, we have to think  about what kind of person our writer is...

Olivia:     Yes . and the historical context and so on. So for  my writer, Emily Bronte, the biography gave a really strong  impression of the place where she lived and the countryside  around.

Joey:     Right, I'm beginning to get the idea.

Joey:     Er can I check the other requirements with you?

Olivia:     Sure

Joey:     The handout said after we'd read the biography, we had to read the work we'd chosen by our author and choose a passage that's typical in some way that typifies the author's interests and style.

Olivia:     Yes, but at the same time it has to relate tc the biographical extract you choose there's gotta be some sort of theme linking them

Joey:     OK. I'm with you

Olivia:     And then you have to think about the video.

Joey:     So are we meant to dramatise the scene we choose?

Olivia:     I guess we could, but there's not a lot of time for that ... I think it’s more how we can use things like sound effects tc create the atmosphere, the feeling we want.

Joey:     And presumably visuals as well?

Olivia:     Yeah, of course - I mean, I suppose that's the whole point of making a video but whatever we use has to be historically in keeping with the author. We can use things like digital image processing to do it all

Joey:     So we can use any computer software we want?

Olivia:     Sure. And it's important that we use a range - not just one software program That's actually one of the things we're assessed on.

Joey:     OK.

Olivia:     Oh, and something else that’s apparently really important is to keep track of the materials we use and to acknowledge them

Joey:     Including stuff we download oft the Internet presumably?

Olivia:     Yeah, so our video has to list all the material used with details of the source in a bibliography at the end.

Joey:     OK And you were talking about assessment of the protect did they give us the criteria? I couldn't find anything on the handout.

Olivia:     Sure He gave us them in the lecture. Let’s see. you get 25 percent just for getting all the components done that’s both sets of reading, and the video. Then the second part is actually how successful we are at getting the essence of the work, they call that ’content’ and that counts for 50 percent Then the last 25 percent is on the video itself, the artistic and technical side.

Joey:     Great Well, that sounds a lot of work, but a whole lot better than just handing n a paper. Thanks a lot, Olivia

Olivia:     You're welcome.

Section 2

Announcer: One of the most anticipated art events-m Christchurch is the Chanty Art Sale, organised this year by Neil Curtis. Ne»l, tell us all about it Neil: Well, Diane, this looks like being the biggest art sale yet, and the best th ng about it is that the money raised will all go to charity. So what you probably want to know first is where it is. Well, the pictures will be on view all this week, most of them at the Star Gallery in the shopping mall, but we have so many pictures this year that we're also showing some in the cafe next door, so do drop in and see them any day between 9.00 and 5.00. Now if you're interested in buying rather than just looking - and we hope a lot of you will be the actual sale will take place on Thursday evening, with sales starting at 7.30 - refreshments will be available before the sale, starting at 6.30. We’ve got about 50 works by local artists showing a huge range of styles and media, and in a minute. I'll tell you about some of them. You’re probably also interested in what’s going to happen to your money once you've handed it over well, all proceeds will go to support children who are disabled, both here in New Zealand and also in other countries, so you can find an original painting, support local talent, and help these children all at the same time.

Now let me tell you a bit about some ot the artists who have kindly agreed to donate their pictures to the Charity Art Sale.

One of them 15 Don Studley, who has a special interest in the art sale because his five-year-old daughter was born with a serious back problem After an operation earlier this year, she's now doing fine, but Don says he wants to offer something to help other less fortunate children. Don is totally self taught, and says he's passionate about painting. His paintings depict some of our New Zealand birds in their natural habitats.

One relative newcomer to New Zealand is James Chang, who came here from Taiwan nine years ago. At the age of 56, Mr Chang had 13 exhibitions in Taiwan before he came to live here in Christchurch so he's a well-established artist and art has been a lifelong passion for him. His paintings are certainly worth looking at - if you like abstract pictures with strong colour schemes, you'll love them.

Natalie Stevens was born in New Zealand, but has exhibited in China. Australia and Spain. As well as being an artist, she's a website designer. She believes art should be universal, and her paintings use soft colours and a mixture of media Most of her pictures are portraits so watch out - some of them may even be friends of yours.

And then we have Christine Shin, from Korea. Christine only started to learn English two years ago, when she arrived in New Zealand, but she's been painting professionally for over ten years and she sure knows how to communicate strong messages through the universal language of art She usually works from photographs, and paints delicate watercolours, which combine traditional Asian influences with New Zealand landscapes, giving a very special view of our local scenery.

Well, that's all I have time to tell you now, but as well as these four, there are many other artists whose work will be on sale so do come along on Thursday We accept cheques, credit cards 01 cash and remember, even if you don't buy a picture you can always make a donation!

Section 1

Mrs Blake:     Hello?

Conor:     Oh, hello I'm ringing about the advertisement in yesterday’s newspaper... the one for the bookcases can you tell me if They're still available?

Mrs Blake:     We've sold one, but we still have twoavailable.

Conor:     Right. Err... can you tell me a bit about them?

Mrs Blake:     Sure, er. what do you want to know?

Conor:     Well, I'm looking for something to tit in my study, so. well, I’m not too worried about the height, but the width's quite important Can you tell me how wide each of them is?

Mrs Blake:     They're both exactly the same size let me see. I’ve got the details written down somewhere. Yes. so they're both 75 cmwide and 180 cm high

Conor:     OK. fine, that should fit m OK. And I don't want anything that looks too severe . . not made of metal, for example I was really looking for something made of wood?

Mrs Blake:     That's all right, they are, both of them

Conor:     So. are they both the same price as well?

Mrs Blake:     No, I he first bookcase is quite a bit cheaper. It's just £15.00. We paid £60.00 for it just five years ago. so it's very good value. It's in perfectly good condition, they're both in very good condition in tact, but the first one isn't the same quality as the other one It's a good sturdy bookcase, it used to be in my son’s room, but it could do with a fresh coat of paint...

Conor:     Oh, it’s painted?

Mrs Blake:     Yes, it’s cream at present, but as I say you could easily change that if you wanted to fit in with your colour scheme.

Conor:     Yes. I'd probably paint it white if I got it Let's see, what else ... how many shelves has it got?

Mrs Blake:     Six two of them are fixed, and the other four are adjustable so you can shift them up and down according to the sizes of your books.

Conor:     Right, fine Well that certainly sounds like a possibility.

Mrs Blake:     But the second one's a lovely bookcase too. That's not painted, it’s just the natural wood colour, a dark brown It was my grandmother’s, and I think she bought it sometime in the 1930s so I'd say it must be getting on for eighty years old, it’s very good quality, they don’t make them like that nowadays

Conor:     And you said it's the same dimensions as the first one?

Mrs Blake:     Yes, and it's got the six shelves, but it also has a cupboard at the bottom that’s really useful for keeping odds and ends in.

Conor:     Right

Mrs Blake:     Oh. And I nearly forgot to say, the other thing about it is it's got glass doors, so the books are all kept out of the dust. So it's really good value for the money. I’m really sorry to be selling it but we just don’t have the room for it.

Conor:     Mmm So what are you asking for that one?

Mrs Blake:     £95.00 It's quite a bit more, but it’s a lovely piece of furniture - a real heirloom.

Conor:     Yes all the same, it's a lot more than wanted to pay .. I didn't really want to go above thirty or forty Anyway, the first one sounds fine for what' need.

Mrs Blake:     Just as you like.

Conor:     So is it all right if I come round and have a look this evening, then if it's OK I can take it away with me?

Mrs Blake:     Of course. So you’ll be coming by car. will you?

Conor:     ‘ve got a friend with a van, so I'll get him to bring me round, if you can just give me the details of where you live.

Mrs Blake:     Sure. I'm Mrs Blake. ..

Conor:     B-L-A K E?

Mrs Blake:     That's right, and the address is 41 Oak Rise, that’s in Stanton.

Conor:     OK so I'll be coming from the town centre, can you give me an idea of where you are?

Mrs Blake:     Yes. You know the road that goes out towards the university?

Conor:     Yes.

Mrs Blake:     Well you take that road, and you go on till you get to a roundabout, go straight on, then Oak Rise is the first road to the right.

Conor:     Out towards the university, past the roundabout, first left?

Mrs Blake:     First right. And we're at the end of the road.

Conor:     Got it. So I’ll be round at about 7:00, if that's alright. Oh, and my name's Conor .. Conor Field.

Mrs Blake:     Fine I’ll see you then, Conor Goodbye

Conor:     Goodbye