In the IELTS exam, the reading section is one of the top-scoring parts if you have practiced sufficiently. Moreover, the IELTS Reading Summary Completion is a challenging task, but practice for the same is beneficial and will help you ace up the score. Therefore, this blog will help in preparing for this task and tackle every challenge faced. Further, you will also go through the strategies that will improve your summary completion answers. So, read till the end for more detail.
Table of Contents
The IELTS Reading Summary Completion Questions are common in the test that appears in the IELTS academic exam. This task examines your skills to grasp information from a long text. Moreover, it checks your vocabulary and paraphrasing skills also as you have to identify the information written in different words and styles. Therefore, it becomes important for you to practice the summary completion IELTS reading questions.
There are 2 types of questions in Summary completion in IELTS. They are:
These are the 2 types of questions in the IELTS Reading Summary Completion. This section will make it easy for you to identify the type easily.
The probability of you getting a passage with IELTS Reading Summary Completion type of questions is high and can help you get a good score in the overall section. Thus, read the samples below and carry the approach in your exam to score well.
This is the first sample containing summary completion IELTS reading questions. Thus, read it to know the correct way of answering the questions.
IELTS Reading Passage – Let’s Go Bats
A. Bats have a problem: how to find their way around in the dark. They hunt at night, and cannot use light to help them find prey and avoid obstacles. You might say that this is a problem of their own making, one that they could avoid simply by changing their habits and hunting by day. But the daytime economy is already heavily exploited by other creatures such as birds. Given that there is a living to be made at night, and given that alternative daytime trades are thoroughly occupied, natural selection has favoured bats that make a go of the night-hunting trade. It is probable that the nocturnal trades go way back in the ancestry of all mammals. In the time when the dinosaurs dominated the daytime economy, our mammalian ancestors probably only managed to survive at all because they found ways of scraping a living at night. Only after the mysterious mass extinction of the dinosaurs about 65 million years ago were our ancestors able to emerge into the daylight in any substantial numbers.
B. Bats have an engineering problem: how to find their way and find their prey in the absence of light. Bats are not the only creatures to face this difficulty today. Obviously the night-flying insects that they prey on must find their way about somehow. Deep-sea fish and whales have little or no light by day or by night. Fish and dolphins that live in extremely muddy water cannot see because, although there is light, it is obstructed and scattered by the dirt in the water. Plenty of other modern animals make their living in conditions where seeing is difficult or impossible.
C. Given the questions of how to manoeuvre in the dark, what solutions might an engineer consider? The first one that might occur to him is to manufacture light, to use a lantern or a searchlight. Fireflies and some fish (usually with the help of bacteria) have the power to manufacture their own light, but the process seems to consume a large amount of energy. Fireflies use their light to attract mates. This doesn't require a prohibitive amount of energy: a male’s tiny pinprick of light can be seen by a female from some distance on a dark night since her eyes are exposed directly to the light source itself. However, using light to find one's own way around requires vastly more energy since the eyes have to detect the tiny fraction of the light that bounces off each part of the scene. The light source must therefore be immensely brighter if it is to be used as a headlight to illuminate the path, than if it is to be used as a signal to others. In any event, whether or not the reason is the energy expense, it seems to be the case that, with the possible exception of some weird deep-sea fish, no animal apart from man uses manufactured light to find its way about.
D. What else might the engineer think of? Well, blind humans sometimes seem to have an uncanny sense of obstacles in their path. It has been given the name 'facial vision’, because blind people have reported that it feels a bit like the sense of touch, on the face. One report tells of a totally blind boy who could ride his tricycle at good speed around the block near his home, using facial vision. Experiments showed that, in fact, facial vision is nothing to do with touch or the front of the face, although the sensation may be referred to the front of the face, like the referred pain in a phantom limb. The sensation of facial vision, it turns out, really goes in through the ears.
Blind people, without even being aware of the fact, are actually using echoes of their own footsteps and of other sounds, to sense the presence of obstacles. Before this was discovered, engineers had already built instruments to exploit the principle, for example to measure the depth of the sea under a ship. After this technique had been invented, it was only a matter of time before weapons designers adapted it for the detection of submarines. Both sides in the Second World War relied heavily on these devices, under such codenames as Asdic (British) and Sonar (American), as well as Radar (American) or RDF (British), which uses radio echoes rather than sound echoes.
E. The Sonar and Radar pioneers didn't know it then, but all the world now knows that bats, or rather natural selection working on bats, had perfected the system tens of millions of years earlier; and their radar' achieves feats of detection and navigation that would strike an engineer dumb with admiration. It is technically incorrect to talk about bat 'radar', since they do not use radio waves. It is sonar. But the underlying mathematical theories of radar and sonar are very similar, and much of our scientific understanding of the details of what bats are doing has come from applying radar theory to them. The American zoologist Donald Griffin, who was largely responsible for the discovery of sonar in bats, coined the term 'écholocation' to cover both sonar and radar, whether used by animals or by human instruments.
Questions: Complete the summary below.
Choose ONE WORD ONLY from the passage for each answer.
Write your answers in boxes 6-9 on your answer sheet.
Facial Vision
Blind people report that so-called ‘facial vision' is comparable to the sensation of touch on the face. In fact, the sensation is more similar to the way in which pain from a 1...... arm or leg might be felt. The ability actually comes from perceiving 2....... through the ears. However, even before this was understood, the principle had been applied in the design of instruments which calculated the 3..... of the seabed. This was followed by a wartime application in devices for finding 4......
Answers with Explanation:
1. The sixth line of paragraph 4 mentions that for blind people facial vision is nothing to touch or front of the face. However, it may be referred to as the pain in a phantom limb. It is the pain that is felt in the missing body part.
2. As per the information in the 4th paragraph, it turns out the sensation goes through the ear. Further, blind people use echoes of their steps to sense the obstacles. Thus, it may be concluded that it is through ears that they perceive echoes/obstacles. As a result, they can navigate themselves.
3. According to the 9th line of the fourth passage, engineers had built instruments to exploit the principle. This was long before it was discovered that blind people use their echoes. Further, it was used to calculate the depth of the sea under a ship.
4. The last few lines of the 4th paragraph mention that the technique was used to detect submarines. Further, it was during the Second World War that this was used. Thus, it can be concluded that in wartime these devices were used to find submarines.
Explore 100+ IELTS Reading Practice Tests with Answers to Prepare for Reading Section
Here, you will go through the another sample with IELTS reading summary completion questions. Go through it to know the correct tone of answering them.
IELTS Reading Passage- Bondi Beach
A Bondi Beach, Australia’s most famous beach, is located in the suburb of Bondi, in the Local Government Area of Waverley, seven kilometres from the centre of Sydney. “Bondi” or “Boondi” is an Aboriginal word meaning water breaking over rocks or the sound of breaking waves. The Australian Museum records that Bondi means a place where a flight of nullas took place. There are Aboriginal Rock carvings on the northern end of the beach at Ben Buckler and south of Bondi Beach near McKenzies Beach on the coastal walk.
B The indigenous people of the area at the time of European settlement have generally been welcomed as the Sydney people or the Eora (Eora means “the people”). One theory describes the Eora as a sub-group of the Darug language group which occupied the Cumberland Plain west to the Blue Mountains. However, another theory suggests that they were a distinct language group of their own. There is no clear evidence for the name or names of the particular band(s) of the Eora that roamed what is now the Waverley area. A number of place names within Waverley, most famously Bondi, have been based on words derived from Aboriginal languages of the Sydney region.
C From the mid-1800s Bondi Beach was a favourite location for family outings and picnics. The beginnings of the suburb go back to 1809, when the early road builder, William Roberts, received from Governor Bligh a grant of 81 hectares of what is now most of the business and residential area of Bondi Beach. In 1851, Edward Smith Hall and Francis O’Brien purchased 200 acres of the Bondi area that embraced almost the whole frontage of Bondi Beach, and it was named the “The Bondi Estate.” Between 1855 and 1877 O’Brien purchased Hall’s share of the land, renamed the land the “O’Brien Estate,” and made the beach and the surrounding land available to the public as a picnic ground and amusement resort. As the beach became increasingly popular, O’Brien threatened to stop public beach access. However, the Municipal Council believed that the Government needed to intervene to make the beach a public reserve.
D During the 1900s beach became associated with health, leisure and democracy – a playground everyone could enjoy equally. Bondi Beach was a working-class suburb throughout most of the twentieth century with migrant people from New Zealand comprising the majority of the local population. The first tramway reached the beach in 1884. Following this, the tram became the first public transportation in Bondi. As an alternative, this action changed the rule that only rich people could enjoy the beach. By the 1930s Bondi was drawing not only local visitors but also people from elsewhere in Australia and overseas. Advertising at the time referred to Bondi Beach as the “Playground of the Pacific”.
E There is a growing trend that people prefer having to relax near the seaside instead of living unhealthily in cities. The increasing popularity of sea bathing during the late 1800s and early 1900s raised concerns about public safety and how to prevent people from drowning. In response, the world’s first formally documented surf lifesaving club, the Bondi Surf Bathers’ Life Saving Club, was formed in 1907. This was powerfully reinforced by the dramatic events of “Black Sunday” at Bondi in 1938. Some 35,000 people were on the beach and a large group of lifesavers were about to start a surf race when three freak waves hit the beach, sweeping hundreds of people out to sea. Lifesavers rescued 300 people. The largest mass rescue in the history of surf bathing, it confirmed the place of the lifesaver in the national imagination.
F Bondi Beach is the endpoint of the City to Surf Fun Run which is held each year in August. Australian surf carnivals further instilled this image. A Royal Surf Carnival was held at Bondi Beach for Queen Elizabeth II during her first visit to Australia in 1954. Since 1867, there have been over fifty visits by a member of the British Royal Family to Australia. In addition to many activities, the Bondi Beach Markets is open every Sunday. Many wealthy people spend Christmas Day at the beach. However, the shortage of houses occurs when lots of people rush to the seaside. Manly is the seashore town which solved this problem. However, people still choose Bondi as the satisfied destination rather than Manly.
G Bondi Beach has a commercial area along Campbell Parade and adjacent side streets, featuring many popular cafes, restaurants, and hotels, with views of the contemporary beach. It is depicted as wholly modern and European. In the last decade, Bondi Beaches’ unique position has seen a dramatic rise in svelte houses and apartments to take advantage of the views and scent of the sea. The valley running down to the beach is famous worldwide for its view of distinctive red-tiled roofs. Those architectures are deeply influenced by British coastal towns.
H Bondi Beach hosted the beach volleyball competition at the 2000 Summer Olympics. A temporary 10,000-seat stadium, a much smaller stadium, 2 warm-up courts, and 3 training courts were set up to host the tournament. The Bondi Beach Volleyball Stadium was constructed for it and stood for just six weeks. Campaigners oppose both the social and environmental consequences of the development. The stadium will divide the beach in two and seriously restrict public access for swimming, walking, and other forms of outdoor recreation. People protest for their human rights of having a pure seaside and argue for healthy life in Bondi.
I “They’re prepared to risk lives and risk the Bondi beach environment for the sake of eight days of volleyball”, said Stephen Uniacke, a construction lawyer involved in the campaign. Other environmental concerns include the possibility that soil dredged up from below the sand will acidify when brought to the surface.
Questions:
Bondi Beach holds the feature sports activities every year, which attracts a lot of___________ 1 choosing to live at this place during holidays. But local accommodation cannot meet with the expanding population, a nearby town of___________2 is the first suburb site to support the solution, yet people prefer ___________ 3 as their best choice. Its seaside buildings are well-known in the world for the special scenic coloured___________ 4 on buildings and the joyful smell from the sea.
Answers with Explanation:
1. According to the fifth and sixth lines of paragraph F, it states that on Christmas, the beach was occupied by wealthy people. Therefore, here, the answer is wealthy people.
2. As per the last few lines of paragraph F, the issue of house scarcity, especially at the time of Christmas, was resolved by Manly, the seashore town near the beach. It showcases that it was resolving the scarcity problem. Therefore, the answer is manly.
3. The last line of paragraph F states that even during the housing scarcity, people prefer living in Bondi instead of Manly. Hence, the answer is Bondi.
4. According to the last few lines of paragraph G, the architecture of Bondi Beach, specifically the red-tiled roofs on the building, is famous for its beautiful scenery worldwide. It showcases the different features of the beach. So, here, the answer is titled roofs.
These are the samples of the reading passages containing questions of summary completion in IELTS exam. Practice them yourself and improve your IELTS reading skills. Moreover, a few more examples are also mentioned in the section below to help you understand the concept well and practice it thoroughly.
Here, 10 more passages are mentioned that have IELTS reading summary completion questions for your practice.
1. The Fruit Book Reading answer
2. The Cells from Hell Reading answer
3. Eco-Resort Management Practices Reading answer
4. Greying Population Stays in the Pink Reading answer
5. Tackling Obesity in the Western World Reading answer
6. The History of Salt Reading answer
7. Second Nature Reading answer
8. Raising the Mary Rose Reading answer
9. This Marvellous Invention Reading answer
10. Biology of Bitterness Reading answer
Check these passages and you can also take the help of the IELTS reading practice test, which will help you understand the exam syllabus and format and practice accordingly. Moreover, there are some tips and strategies mentioned in the next section that will help you solve the summary completion answers effectively.
The effective tips to solve the IELTS Reading Summary Completion questions are:
To conclude, this was all about the IELTS Reading Summary Completion. Here, you will go through two samples that will help you understand the best way to answer this type of question, and on top of that, 10 examples are also shared for your practice. Moreover, there are a few strategies and tips discussed in this passage that will help you improve your preparations and score gradually. However, if you face any issues during the exam preparation, take the help of the academic experts who will help you improve your IELTS band score. So, reach out to them today, take coaching classes, and get the desired score.
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