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Estimated with the standard Listening conversion. Every question below now shows the correct answer and what confirmed it — and the full transcript is open at the bottom so you can trace anything you missed.
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Section 1
A parent telephones a music school to enrol her daughter for lessons · Receptionist, Parent
Questions 1-7
Complete the form below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.
1Child's surname: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
2Age: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
3Contact number: 0795 621 ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
4Instrument: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
5Teacher: Mr ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
6Lesson day: ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
7Cost per lesson: £ ______
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Questions 8-10
Answer the questions below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.
8What is included in the monthly instrument hire fee?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
9Which street is the Saturday entrance on?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
10What must Isla take to her first lesson?
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 2
A library manager announces renovation plans and temporary arrangements · Manager
Questions 11-13
Choose the correct letter, A, B or C.
11What is the main reason for the renovation?
12What does the manager say about the reopening date?
13Which service will NOT be available during the closure?
Questions 14-17
Where is each service moving during the renovation? Choose the correct letter, A–F, from the plan description below.
Temporary locations around the town centre — the library faces the community hall across Bridge Street; the museum is two streets north on Chandler Row; the former Midland bank is halfway along the High Street; St Mary's church hall is behind the marketplace.
A = the community hall on Bridge Street B = the museum reading room on Chandler Row C = the former bank on the High Street D = St Mary's church hall behind the marketplace E = the town hall foyer F = a mobile van in the supermarket car park
- A the community hall on Bridge Street
- B the museum reading room on Chandler Row
- C the former bank on the High Street
- D St Mary's church hall behind the marketplace
- E the town hall foyer
- F a mobile van in the supermarket car park
14main lending service
15children's library and storytime
16reference and local history collections
17computer suite and coding club
Questions 18-20
Complete the sentences below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.
18Books borrowed before the move can be kept for ______ weeks.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
19During the temporary arrangements, no ______ will be charged on late returns.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
20People wishing to volunteer for the book move should contact the manager by ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 3
Two students plan their entry for a university robotics competition with their mentor · Dr Novak, Lena, Marcus
Questions 21-24
Choose the correct letter, A, B or C.
21Why have the students chosen tracks instead of wheels?
22Why did the students reject ultrasonic sensors?
23What do the students finally agree about the gripper?
24What has changed about the team's practice sessions?
Questions 25-27
Who will be responsible for each task? Choose A, B or C. NB You may use any letter more than once.
- A Lena
- B Marcus
- C Dr Novak
25writing the line-following software
26managing the budget and ordering parts
27writing the design log
Questions 28-30
Complete the sentences below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER for each answer.
28This year the team is allowed to spend a maximum of £ ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
29The design log must be submitted by the ______ of May.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
30Practice sessions will now be held on Fridays at ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS AND/OR A NUMBER
Section 4
A lecture on the anthropology of gift-giving · Lecturer
Questions 31-40
Complete the notes below. Write NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS for each answer.
31Reciprocity: giving that creates an ______ to give something back.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
32Mauss used the Maori word 'hau' for the giver's ______ carried by every object.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
33Kula valuables travel by canoe around a ring of ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
34A kula object's value comes from its ______ of famous previous holders.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
35The belief that a true gift expects nothing back is called the ______ gift.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
36Malinowski later changed his ______ about parent–child gifts being genuinely free.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
37Refusing a gift harms the ______ because it breaks the cycle of exchange.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
38Unlike gifts, commodities are typically exchanged between ______.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
39Titmuss found that paying blood donors lowered the ______ of the blood collected.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
40The gift–commodity distinction is best seen as a ______ rather than a wall.
NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS
Audio script / transcript
Trace every answer back to the exact words. Distractors — changes of mind, corrections, rejected options — are part of the recording, so read the whole exchange, not just one line.
Section 1 — A parent telephones a music school to enrol her daughter for lessons
Receptionist:Good morning, Brookdale Music School. This is Owen — how can I help?
Parent:Hello. I'd like to enrol my daughter for lessons, please. She's been desperate to start since her school concert.
Receptionist:Lovely. Let me set up her file. What's her name?
Parent:Isla Renshaw. Isla is I-S-L-A.
Receptionist:And Renshaw — R-E-N-S-H-A-W-E, with an E on the end?
Parent:No E at the end, just R-E-N-S-H-A-W. It's the shorter spelling.
Receptionist:R-E-N-S-H-A-W, got it. How old is Isla?
Parent:She's nine — ten in March, if that matters for the grouping.
Receptionist:Nine is what I put down; we update it automatically. And a contact number for you?
Parent:It's oh-seven-nine-five, six-two-one, three-four-eight... oh, I'm so sorry, I always do this — I've swapped the last digits. It's three-eight-four. Oh-seven-nine-five, six-two-one, three-eight-four.
Receptionist:Zero seven nine five, six two one, three eight four. No problem at all. Now — which instrument?
Parent:Well, at school she's only played the recorder, and her teacher suggested the violin because we already own one. But Isla's absolutely set on the cello. She heard one at the concert and hasn't talked about anything else since.
Receptionist:Then cello it should be — children practise the instrument they love. So I'll register her for cello. We have two cello teachers. Miss Hart teaches the very beginners on weekday afternoons, and Mr Duval takes the Saturday students.
Parent:Weekdays are tricky — I don't finish work until six. What does Mr Duval have?
Receptionist:Let's see. He had a Tuesday slot at five, but actually he's just given up his weekday teaching this term, so he's Saturdays only now. He can offer ten fifteen on Saturday mornings.
Parent:Saturday at ten fifteen is honestly better for us anyway. Yes, we'll take that.
Receptionist:Booked: Isla, cello, Mr Duval, Saturdays at ten fifteen. Individual lessons are sixteen pounds for thirty minutes.
Parent:That's fine. Now, the big question — do we have to buy a cello? I've seen the prices and they're terrifying.
Receptionist:Please don't buy one yet. Children grow out of sizes so quickly — Isla will need a half-size now and probably a three-quarter in a year or two. We run a hire scheme: twelve pounds a month, and that includes the insurance, so if it gets damaged at school you're covered.
Parent:Twelve a month with insurance included — that's a relief. We'll hire, definitely.
Receptionist:Sensible choice. She can collect the instrument at her first lesson. One practical thing: on Saturdays the main door on Queen's Road is locked, so come round to the side entrance on Duke Street — there's a green door with a buzzer.
Parent:The side entrance on Duke Street. We'll find it. Should she bring anything?
Receptionist:Just a notebook — Mr Duval writes the practice tasks in it every week. Music books come later, once he's seen her hands.
Parent:A notebook, easy. Thank you so much, Owen. She'll be over the moon.
Receptionist:Our pleasure. We'll see Isla on Saturday.
Section 2 — A library manager announces renovation plans and temporary arrangements
Manager:Good evening, everyone, and thank you for coming to this open meeting about the renovation of Milbrook Library. I'm Janet Okoro, the library manager, and I'll explain what's happening, where our services are moving, and what it means for you.
Manager:First, why now? People keep asking whether this is about creating a trendy café or more computer desks. Those would be nice, but no. The honest answer is the roof. The building is a hundred and forty years old, and last winter we had buckets on the top floor every time it rained. The engineers tell us the whole roof structure has to come off and be rebuilt — everything else in the project, the rewiring, the insulation, is being done because the scaffolding will already be up.
Manager:Now, the timetable — and I'll be straight with you. When we announced the project, we promised to reopen in March. Unfortunately, once the surveyors lifted the floorboards on the upper level, they found the joists were in a far worse state than anyone expected, and the extra structural work means we're now looking at September. I know that's disappointing. I'd rather give you an honest date than a hopeful one.
Manager:While we're closed, almost every service continues — just not under one roof. Let me walk you through the town centre. Coming out of the library, the community hall is directly opposite us on Bridge Street. The museum is two streets north, on Chandler Row. The old Midland bank building — empty since the branch closed — is halfway along the High Street. And St Mary's church hall is behind the marketplace.
Manager:The main lending service — adult fiction and non-fiction, returns, reservations — moves across the road to the community hall. Same staff, same library cards, shorter shelves, I'm afraid.
Manager:The children's library, including the Saturday storytime, goes to St Mary's church hall behind the marketplace. There's more floor space there than we've ever had, so storytime is actually doubling in size — no more waiting lists.
Manager:Our reference and local history collections need stable temperature and humidity, so the museum has generously taken those into its reading room on Chandler Row. You'll need to sign in, and the maps and photographs are request-only, but everything remains available.
Manager:The computer suite and the coding club move into the former bank on the High Street — the council has fitted it out with faster broadband than the library ever had, so our IT tutors are quietly delighted.
Manager:One service we sadly cannot continue is the interlibrary loan scheme — requesting books from other library authorities. The courier system runs through our loading bay, which will be inside the building site, so that scheme is suspended until we reopen. The home delivery round for housebound readers, I want to stress, carries on exactly as before.
Manager:A few practical points. All loans made before the move will run for six weeks instead of the usual three, and while we're in temporary premises no fines will be charged on late returns — we're asking for goodwill in both directions. Finally, we need volunteers over the last weekend of this month to help us pack and label the books — around forty thousand of them. If you can spare a morning, please email me directly; the address is on the leaflet on your chairs. Thank you — and I'll take questions in a moment.
Section 3 — Two students plan their entry for a university robotics competition with their mentor
Dr Novak:So — the regional robotics challenge. Entries close Friday week, and you two still owe me a design decision. Wheels or tracks?
Lena:We've settled it, actually. We looked at the arena specification again: the course has two ramps and a stretch of loose sand near the finish. Wheels are faster on the flat, but they spin uselessly in sand — we watched last year's videos and three wheeled robots got stranded there.
Marcus:So tracks it is. We give up a bit of speed, but the robot will actually finish the course, which last year half the field didn't.
Dr Novak:Good — evidence-based, I like it. Now, navigation. Last month you were talking about ultrasonic sensors for detecting the walls.
Marcus:We've abandoned those. In testing they were fine on their own, but the competition rules let four robots run at once, and every team uses ultrasonics. All those pulses bouncing around the arena interfere with each other — we'd be steering on other people's echoes. So we're switching to infrared distance sensors instead. Slightly shorter range, but immune to that problem.
Dr Novak:A rejection for the right reason. And the gripper for the payload task? Lena?
Lena:That's our one running argument. Marcus wants to order the ready-made gripper kit for forty pounds. I think we should design our own and print it at the makerspace — the printing is free for students, and we can shape the jaws exactly to the payload cylinders.
Marcus:My worry was time — a kit arrives working. But... you showed me the print queue is only two days at the moment, and honestly, the judges award design marks for custom parts, don't they? A bought kit earns us nothing there. Okay, you've convinced me. We print our own.
Dr Novak:Agreed, and it protects your budget. Speaking of which, what's the spending cap this year?
Lena:Eighty pounds... no, sorry, I'm wrong — that was last year's figure. The department sponsorship came through, so it's ninety now. Still tight once you've bought motors.
Dr Novak:Ninety, noted. Now divide the work, please, so I know who to chase.
Marcus:I'll take the software — the line-following code and the sensor calibration. I did the microcontroller module last term, so it makes sense.
Lena:And I'll manage the budget spreadsheet and the ordering, since I already have the makerspace account. I'd also like to write the design log — I've kept notes from every meeting anyway, so half of it exists already.
Dr Novak:So Marcus codes; Lena handles money and the log. Remember the log is assessed — when does it have to be submitted?
Lena:The third of May... hang on, no — the third is the team photo deadline. The design log is the thirteenth. I'll put both dates in the shared calendar.
Dr Novak:Please do. Last thing: practice sessions. You've had the lab on Wednesday evenings, but I've had an email from the technician — the lab is being used for open-day demonstrations on Wednesdays for the rest of term. He's offering you Friday at five instead.
Marcus:Friday works for me. Lena?
Lena:Fine by me too — honestly, Fridays we can stay later, which we'll need close to the competition.
Dr Novak:Fridays at five, then, starting this week. Bring the printed gripper as soon as it's off the machine — I want to see it grip something real.
Section 4 — A lecture on the anthropology of gift-giving
Lecturer:Today's lecture is about something you did last December without thinking: giving gifts. To anthropologists, the gift is not a pleasant social decoration — it is one of the oldest machines for building human relationships, and it runs on rules that most givers have never consciously learned.
Lecturer:The key concept is reciprocity. When anthropologists use the word, they mean something quite precise: giving that creates an obligation to give back. Accept a gift, and you accept a debt — not a legal one, but a social one, and social debts are often the more binding kind. The exchange is rarely immediate and rarely exact, and that is the point: as long as the account is slightly open, the relationship must continue.
Lecturer:The classic text here is Marcel Mauss's essay The Gift, published in nineteen twenty-five. Surveying societies from Polynesia to the American north-west coast, Mauss argued that gifts are never really detached from the people who give them. He borrowed a Maori term, hau, to express this: every object carries something of the giver's spirit with it, which is why an unreciprocated gift feels uncomfortable — you are, in a sense, holding a piece of another person.
Lecturer:The most famous field example is the kula, documented by Bronislaw Malinowski in the Trobriand Islands off New Guinea. Kula valuables — red shell necklaces moving in one direction, white shell armbands in the other — travel by canoe around a great ring of islands, passing from partner to partner over many years. Here is the remarkable part: the objects have almost no practical use, and no one keeps them for long. Their worth lies elsewhere — each item accumulates a history, a list of the famous men who have held it, and that history is precisely what makes it precious.
Lecturer:Now for the correction I promised. The popular belief is that a true gift expects nothing in return; anthropologists call this the idea of the pure gift. Interestingly, Malinowski himself first endorsed it: he described gifts between parents and children as genuinely free. But he later changed his mind, and most anthropologists since have agreed with the older Malinowski. Look closely at any so-called free gift and you find expectations attached — gratitude, loyalty, future care. Parents who give constantly to a child expect, at minimum, the relationship itself. The pure gift, on inspection, is a myth we tell to make obligation feel graceful.
Lecturer:And obligation has teeth. In many societies, refusing a gift is close to an insult, because refusal breaks the cycle before it starts — it declares that you do not want the relationship. Cause and effect could hardly be clearer: accept, and the bond continues; refuse, and it is damaged, sometimes permanently.
Lecturer:How do gifts differ from ordinary buying and selling? The economist's commodity moves between strangers: I pay, you hand over the goods, and we owe each other nothing — the transaction closes the relationship. The gift does the opposite: it deliberately leaves the account open.
Lecturer:Does any of this survive in modern economies? Everywhere, once you look. Consider blood donation. Richard Titmuss famously compared Britain's volunteer system with schemes that paid donors, and found the paid systems attracted blood of measurably lower quality — payment drove out the very people who gave for the sake of giving. Companies now spend heavily on corporate gifts for clients for exactly the reason Mauss would predict: a gift, unlike a discount, manufactures loyalty. I should add one qualification before we finish: the line between gift and commodity is not a wall but a continuum — the same bottle of wine can be a commodity at the checkout and a gift an hour later at a dinner party. Objects move along that line constantly, and next week we'll follow them into the strange economics of inheritance.