IELTS Reading Practice Test 24

Zuhana

13 min read

Updated On Mar 28, 2024

Reading Passage 1
Reading Passage 2
Reading Passage 3
Can Animals Count?, A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence IELTS Reading Answers With Explanation
Tips for Answering the Question Types in the above Reading Passages
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The IELTS Reading Module can be the top-scoring category with diligent practice. To achieve the best results in this section, you must understand how to approach and answer the different Question types in the Reading Module. The Academic passages, “Can Animals Count?, A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence” are IELTS reading passages that appeared in an IELTS Reading Test. Try to find the answers to get an idea of the difficulty level of the passages in the actual reading test.

The question types found in the Can Animals Count?, A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence passages are:

Reading Passage 1 (Can Animals Count?)

Table/ Note completion (Q. 1-7)
True/False/Not Given (Q. 8-13)

Reading Passage 2 ( A Revolutionary Material)

Matching Headings (Questions 14-18)
Matching Features (Q. 19 – 23)
Summary completion (Q. 24 – 26)

Reading Passage 3 (The Growth of Intelligence)

Multiple-choice questions (Q. 27-30)
Yes/No or Not Given (Q. 30 – 36)
Summary completion (Q. 37 – 40)

Reading Passage 1

Can Animals Count?

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1 -13 based on Reading Passage 1 below.

Click on the link to practice the reading passage – Can Animals Count? PDF

Reading Passage 2

A Revolutionary Material

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 14 -26 based on Reading Passage 2 below.

Click on the link to practice the reading passage – A Revolutionary Material PDF

Reading Passage 3

The Growth of Intelligence

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 27 – 40 based on Reading Passage 3 below.

Click on the link to practice the reading passage – The Growth of Intelligence PDF

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Can Animals Count?, A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence IELTS Reading Answers With Explanation

Find below the explanation along with the answers for all the 3 given IELTS reading passages that you just attempted to solve!

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Explanation and Answers

Can Animals Count? – IELTS Reading Answers (Passage 1)

Questions 1 – 13

Answer: identical

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The first paragraph says ‘The students’ performance ends up looking just like a monkey’s. It’s practically [= almost] identical’.

Answer: balls of paper

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The sixth paragraph says ‘… showed it two groups of balls of paper … changed the quantities’ (although the text mentions ‘siblings’ and ‘brothers’, the experiment did not use other chicks).

Answer: female

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The last paragraph says ‘researchers in America found that female coots appear to calculate’ (the text also mentions ‘an intruder’, but it was the ‘counting’ behaviour/behaviour of the coots that the researchers were interested in).

Answer: fruit flies

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The second paragraph says ‘tempted salamanders with two sets of fruit flies held in clear tubes’.

Answer: mosquitofish

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The third paragraph says ‘studies of mosquitofish, which instinctively join the biggest shoal’.

Answer: surface area

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The fourth paragraph says ‘The team arranged these shapes so that they had the same overall [= total] surface area and luminance [= brightness] …’.

Answer: sugar water

Question Type: Sentence Completion

Answer Explanation: The fifth paragraph says ‘two chambers – one which contained sugar water, which they like, while the other was empty. … The bees quickly learned … the correct chamber’.

Answer: TRUE

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: The first paragraph says ‘rhesus monkeys and university students … had to decide which set contained more objects…. monkeys, like humans, make more errors when two sets of objects are close in number’; primates are defined in the second paragraph:‘Humans and monkeys are mammals, in the animal family known as primates.’

Answer: FALSE

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: The fifth paragraph says ‘the number of shapes [= how many shapes, not the actual shape of individual numerals]’.

Answer: NOT GIVEN

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: Although the sixth paragraph says ‘If chicks spend their first few days surrounded by certain objects’, this is a general statement, not how long the experiment lasted; ‘three- and four-day-old chicks’ tells us the age of the chicks, but it does not say that the experiment took place on two days; we do not know whether it was repeated on more than one day.

Answer: TRUE

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: The sixth paragraph says that these were almost newborn ‘three- and four-day-old chicks’ and that they ‘scuttled [= ran] to the larger quantity at a rate well above chance. They were doing some very simple arithmetic, claim the researchers’.

Answer: NOT GIVEN

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: Although the last paragraph says ‘Animals on the prowl … decide which tree has the most fruit, or which patch of flowers will contain the most nectar’ and that this would be an ‘obvious advantage[s] of numeracy’, we are not told whether any researchers have carried out experiments involving the animals searching for these foods.

Answer: TRUE

Question Type: True, False, Not given

Answer Explanation: The last paragraph says ‘female coots appear to calculate … and add any in the nest laid by an intruder [= another bird]’.

Questions 14 – 26

A Revolutionary Material IELTS Reading Answers (Passage 2)

Answer: Vi

Question Type: Matching Headings

Answer Explanation: ‘The facts, however, do not justify our unease.’

Answer: i

Question Type: Matching Headings

Answer Explanation: ‘… a squall [= storm] of conflicting initiatives … It’s a squall that dies down and then blows harder from one month to the next.’

Answer: V

Question Type: Matching Headings

Answer Explanation: ‘… there’s nothing quite like plastic.’

Answer: iii

Question Type: Matching Headings

Answer Explanation: ‘… there is one law of plastic that… prevails over [= is more important than] all others …. a little goes a long way … And in the packaging equation, weight is the main issue … ’

Answer: Vii

Question Type: Matching Headings

Answer Explanation: ‘To target plastic on its own is to evade the complexity of the issues.’

Answer: C

Question Type: Matching Features

Answer Explanation: Paragraph E says ‘… explains that in fact they found apples in fours on a tray covered by plastic film needed 27 per cent less packaging in transportation than those sold loose [= not wrapped before they are sold]’.

Answer: A

Question Type: Matching Features

Answer Explanation: Paragraph B says ‘It is being left to the individual conscience’.

Answer: B

Question Type: Matching Features

Answer Explanation: Paragraph C says ‘… in the UK, waste in supply chains [= the way goods get from producer to consumer] is about 3 per cent’.

Answer: D

Question Type: Matching Features

Answer Explanation: Paragraph E says ‘the hunger [= desire] to do something quickly is diverting effort away from more complicated questions’.

Answer: A

Question Type: Matching Features

Answer Explanation: Paragraph E says ‘Plastic as a lightweight food wrapper is now built-in as the logical thing … It only makes sense if you have a structure [i.e. social structure, society] such as exists now.’

Answer: industrial (Paragraph A)

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer: indestructible (Paragraph A)

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer: seasons (Paragraph A)

Question Type: Summary Completion

Questions 27 – 40

The Growth of Intelligence Reading Answers (Passage 3)

Answer: A

Question Type: Multiple Choice Questions

Answer Explanation: The first paragraph says ‘intelligence involves the capacity … to adapt to one’s environment’.

Distraction B: There is no suggestion in the text that we change behaviour according to what other people do; C: The word ‘environment’ is used in this text in a more abstract way, i.e. ‘surroundings’; D: Although the text states that the ‘capacity … to learn from experience’ is one feature of intelligence and we can suppose that coping with ‘unexpected setbacks’ would be one outcome of learning from experience, which is one feature of intelligence, this is not stated anywhere in the text.

Answer: B

Question Type: Multiple Choice Questions

Answer Explanation: The second paragraph says ‘The former group [‘psychometricians’ in the previous paragraph] has examined the issue by determining how children’s abilities on a wide range of tasks intercorrelate, or go together.’

Distraction A: Although there is a wide range of ‘tasks’, there is no suggestion that any of them are ‘cooperative’. However, psychometricians are interested in how the individual tasks ‘intercorrelate, or go together’; C: The text only states that psychometricians have used statistics in their research, not that they use mathematical models to predict results; D: ‘Common sense’ [- good practical, logical abilities] is not the same as ‘general intelligence’ [overall intellectual ability],

Answer: D

Question Type: Multiple Choice Questions

Answer Explanation: The third paragraph says ‘studies of age-related changes …

For instance, … Horn and Cattell … fluid abilities peak in early adult life, whereas crystallised abilities increase up to advanced old age’.

Distraction A: Horn and Cattell didn’t argue with each other. Instead they ‘argued for’ something [= they put forward the idea]; B: It is true that Their research concerned both linguistic and mathematical abilities’ (tests of‘mental manipulation of abstract symbols’ and ‘comprehension and information’) but this is not why Horn and Cattell are mentioned; C: Their research was about certain special skills, but not general intelligence.

Answer: B

Question Type: Multiple Choice Questions

Answer Explanation: The fifth paragraph says ‘the focus should be on the thinking processes involved rather than on levels of cognitive achievement’.

Distraction A: In fact, the text tells us the opposite: ‘a second element concerns the notion that development proceeds … in a set order’; C: The text does not tell us what materials he used, only that his work was ‘backed up by observations’; D: The text does not describe exactly the range of either ages or intelligence.

Answer: No

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: The first paragraph says ‘quite difficult to define [= what is meant by] in unambiguous terms and unexpectedly controversial [= people disagree about it]’.

Answer: Yes

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: The second paragraph says ‘general measures of intelligence tend to have considerable powers… Nevertheless, it is plain that it is not at all uncommon for individuals to be very good at some sorts of the task and yet quite poor at some others’.

Answer: No

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: The third paragraph says the test suggests the opposite of the statement: ‘Crystallised abilities’ which are ‘assessed by tests of comprehension … increase up to advanced old age’, whereas ‘Fluid abilities … that require mental manipulation of abstract symbols’ ‘by contrast… peak in early adult life’.

Answer: Yes

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: The fourth paragraph says ‘These findings seemed to suggest a substantial lack of continuity [= a big difference] between infancy and middle childhood. However, it is important to realise that the apparent discontinuity [= what appears to be a difference] will vary according to which of the cognitive skills were assessed in infancy.’

Answer: Not Given

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: In the fifth paragraph we are told Piaget was influential regarding both (‘immense body of research’ and ‘subsequent thinking’) but there is no mention that either one of these things had a bigger impact than the other.

Answer: No

Question Type: Yes/No/Not given

Answer Explanation: The last paragraph says ‘his view that the child is an active agent of learning … has stood the test of time [= it is still respected]’, even if the previous paragraph states that ‘most of his concepts have had to be … radically revised, or rejected’. The summary outlines the ideas in the fourth paragraph.

Answer: C: verbal

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer Explanation: ‘verbal abilities are more important later on’.

Answer: A: adult

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer Explanation: ‘It has been found that tests of coping with novelty do predict later intelligence’ (the text does not deal with ‘academic ability’ in particular).

Note: ‘academic ability’ is the natural collocation, not ‘academic intelligence ’

Answer: E: inquisitive

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer Explanation: ‘their interest in and curiosity about the environment’.

Answer: I: unfamiliar

Question Type: Summary Completion

Answer Explanation: ‘the extent to which this is applied to new situations’.

Tips for Answering the Question Types in the above Reading Passages

Let us check out some quick tips to answer the types of questions in the, “A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence” Reading Answers passages

Sentence/Summary Completion:

Sentence/Summary Completion is a type of IELTS reading question that requires you to fill in a gap in a sentence/summary with a word or phrase from the passage.

To answer sentence completion questions, you can use the following strategies:

Read the sentence carefully: This will give you an idea of the type of word or phrase that is missing.
Scan the passage for the keywords: The keywords in the sentence can help you to identify the correct word or phrase.
Read the sentence with the missing word or phrase: This will help you to see how the word or phrase fits into the sentence.
Check your answer: Once you have filled in the gap, make sure that your answer makes sense in the context of the sentence.

True/False/Not Given:

True/False/Not Given questions are a type of IELTS Reading question that requires you to identify whether a statement is true, false, or not given in the passage.

True statements are statements that are explicitly stated in the passage.
False statements are statements that are explicitly contradicted in the passage.
Not Given statements are statements that are neither explicitly stated nor contradicted in the passage

To answer True/False/Not Given questions, you need to be able to understand the passage and identify the key information. You also need to be able to distinguish between statements that are explicitly stated, contradicted, and not given.

Table/Note Completion:

Table/Note completion in the IELTS Reading test is quite simple: because of the arrangement and keywords, you may often discover solutions quickly.

To answer completion questions, you can use the following strategies:

Locate the paragraph containing the keyword
To discover the keywords quickly, use capital letters, numbers/dates, or italics.
To discover the statement, look for synonyms or paraphrased words.
Copy the answers exactly as they appear in the text.

Multiple Choice Questions:

You will be given a reading passage followed by several questions based on the information in the paragraph in multiple choice questions. Your task is to understand the question and compare it to the paragraph in order to select the best solution from the available possibilities.

Before reading the passage, read the question and select the keywords. Check the keyword possibilities if the question statement is short on information.
Then, using the keywords, read the passage to find the relevant information.
To select the correct option, carefully read the relevant words and match them with each option.
You will find several options with keywords that do not correspond to the information.
Try opting for the elimination method mostly.
Find the best option by matching the meaning rather than just the keywords.

Matching Features:

Matching Features is a type of IELTS reading question that requires you to match a list of features to the correct people, places, or things in a passage.

To answer matching features questions, you can use the following strategies:

Read the features first: This will give you an idea of the types of information that you are looking for in the passage.
Read the passage quickly: This will give you a general understanding of the content of the passage.
Match the features to the people, places, or things: As you read the passage, look for the information that matches each feature.
Check your answers: Once you have matched all of the features, double-check your answers to make sure that they are correct.

Matching Headings:

Matching Headings is a type of IELTS reading question that requires you to match a list of headings to the correct paragraphs in a passage. To answer matching headings questions, you can use the following strategies:

Read the headings first: This will give you an idea of the topics that will be covered in the passage.
Read the paragraphs quickly: This will give you a general understanding of the content of each paragraph.
Match the headings to the paragraphs: As you read each paragraph, look for the heading that best summarizes the main idea of the paragraph.
Check your answers: Once you have matched all of the headings, double-check your answers to make sure that they are correct.

Great work on attempting to solve the Can Animals Count?, A Revolutionary Material, and The Growth of Intelligence IELTS reading passages! To crack your IELTS Reading in the first go, try solving more of the recent IELTS reading passages here.