English Set B 2015-2016 HSC Commerce (English Medium) 12th Standard Board Exam Question Paper Solution

(A) Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:
       One afternoon in 1977, as his parents and two brothers fished in the Gulf of Mexico, 12-year old Michael Dell sat on the beach. painstakingly putting together a trotline - a maze of ropes to ''which several fish hooks could be attached."You're wasting your time," the rest of the family called to Michael, as they pulled in fish. "Grab a pole and join in the fun."
        Michael kept working. It was dinner time when he finished, and everyone else was ready to call it a day. Still, the youngster
cast the trotline far into the water. anchoring it to a stick that he plunged deep in the sand.
        Over dinner, his family teased young Michael about coming away empty-handed. But afterward, Michael reeled in his trotline, and on the hooks were more fish than the others had caught all together!
       Michael Dell has always been fond of saying, "If you think you have a good idea, try it!" And today, at 29 he has discovered the power of another good idea that has helped him rise in just a few years from teen to a tycoon. He has become the fourth-largest manufacturer of personal computers in America and the youngest man ever to head a Fortune 500 corporation.
(1) What were Michael Dell’s achievements at his age of 29?
(2) What is the secret of Michael Dell’s Success?
(3) How did Michael surprise his family members?
(4) Do you think trying new ideas can make your life successful? How?
(5) Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed:
(i) He has discovered the power of another good idea.
(Rewrite the sentence beginning with 'The power of ...' )
(ii) Michael Dell sat on the beach.
(Rewrite it using past perfect continuous tense.)
(iii) The youngster cast the trotline.
(Frame a Wh-question to get the underlined part as
its answer.)
(6) 'Grab a pole and join in the fun'.
Pick out the contextual meaning of the underlined word from
the options are given below:
(i) smash
(ii) hold firmly
(iii) throw away

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below :

But being named an 'AdarshGaon · is far from easy. Villages had to give a proposal after Which a committee headed by Mr. Pawar inspected the villages. "The villages had to show dedication in the struggle to fight mediocrity. They had to follow all the conditions of becoming an 'AdarshGaon '. We chose villages with a revolutionary spark." Mr. Pawar says. 

Villages need to follow strict rules. The process begins with effective water managc1nent through the watershed technique and Water auditing. taking responsibility for the village's natural resources -phmting trees and stopping grazing, contributing labour for the village Work, and then expanding to bring about behavioral changes in the people for harbouring social change. Hiware Bazaar is free of any kind of addiction and there are no liquor or tobacco shops in the village. Vasectomy has been made co1npulsory. as is the pre-marital HIV test. 

The 'AdarshGaon · n1odcl prides itself of being based on the joint decisions made by the (Gram Sabha, Where all the villagers are present. Even while selecting the new villages under the scheme, Mr. Pawar made sure that the decision to become an ideal village was taken by the entire village together. 

The greatest victory for Hiware Bazaar so far has been the reverse migration that the village has witnessed since 1989. As many as 93 families have come back to the village, "from the slums in Mumbai and Pune." Mr. Pawar says. 

(1) What features of 'AdarshGaon' are given in this extract?
(2) What is the procedure for selecting 'AdarshGaon'?
(3) What is the greatest victory for Hiware Bazaar? 
(4) Do you think all villages in Maharashtra should follow the ideals of Hiware Bazaar? Why? 
(5) Rewrite the following sentences in the Ways instructed : 

(i) Mr. Pawar inspected the villages. 
(Rewrite it using the noun form of the word underlined.)
(ii) Vasectomy has been made compulsory by the villagers.
(Rewrite it beginning with -"The villagers ........ ".) 
(iii) There are no liquor or tobacco shops in the village. 
(Rewrite it using 'neither ........ nor'.)

(6) Find out the words from the extract which mean : 

(i) causing a great change 
(ii) the quality of being average

Read the following extract and complete the table given below about 'Types of Diseases':

         Health is defined as not simply the absence of disease. It involves a state of feeling well, both in body and in mind. 

      The diseases may be classified into the following types, Some diseases are present at birth. They are called congenital diseases. They may develop during pregnancy or are inherited, Some of them may be caused by environmental factors. Examples of congenital diseases are Down's syndrome, sickle cell anaemia, cystic fibrosis, haemophilia, etc.

      Some diseases are acquired by humans themselves and hence are called Self-Inflicted or Acquired diseases. Examples of acquired diseases are coronary heart diseases, hypertension.

      Some diseases are transmitted from one person to another. They are called as Communicable or Infectious diseases. They are caused by biological agents, Examples of communicable diseases are Cholera, Typhoid, Measles, Malaria, etc.

      Non- communicable diseases are caused by exogenous factors like physical, chemical, nutritional deficiencies. The examples are Kwashiorkor, Pellagra, Scurvy, and Rickets, etc.  

                                                Title

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: 

  To read a lot is essential. It is stupid not to venture outside the examination 'set books' or the textbooks you have chosen for intensive study. Read as many books in English as you can., not as a duty but for pleasure. Do not close the most difficult books you find, with the idea of listing and learning as many new words as possible. choose what is likely to interest you and be sure in advance, that it is not too hard. You should not have to be constantly looking up new words in the dictionary, for that deadens interest and checks real learning. Lookup a word here and there, but as a general policy try to push ahead. guessing what words mean from the context. It is extensive and not intensive reading that normally helps you to get interested in extra reading and thereby improve your English. You should enjoy the feeling which extensive reading gives. As you read, you will become more and more familiar with words and sentence patterns you already know, understanding them better and better as you meet them in more and more contexts, some of which may differ only slightly from others. 

       Some people say that we cannot learn to speak a language better with the help of a book. To believe that the spoken language and written language are quite different things. This is not so.    

Questions:

(1) What does the author tell us about the importance of reading English?

(2) What different steps are suggested to improve reading?

(3) What do some people say about learning the spoken form of a language?

(4) What will you do to improve your English?

(5) Rewrite the following sentences in the ways instructed: 

i. To read a lot is essential. 

(Rewrite using gerund form of the words underlined.)

ii. Some people say that we cannot learn to speak a language better with the help of a book.

(Rewrite it using 'be able to'.)

iii. It is extensive. 

(Make it a Rhetorical question.) 

(6) You should not have to be constantly looking up new words in the dictionary, for that deadens interest and checks real learning.

The underlined word here means: 

(i) develops

(ii) deprives of 

(iii) creates

(B) Write a summary of the above extract with the help of the outline given below and suggest a suitable title. 

Read a lot --- outside the textbooks --- for pleasure --- avoid difficult books ---read interesting ones --- avoid dictionary --- guess meanings --- extensive and not intensive reading --- different opinions. 

Read the following extract and answer the questions given  below:

While I lay awake in bed,
God's still small voice came to me and said,
"While dealing with a stranger, common courtesy you use,
But the children you love, you seem to abuse.
Look on the kitchen floor,
You'll find some flowers there by the door.
Those are the flowers she brought for you.
She picked them herself, pink, yellow and blue.
She stood quietly not to spoil the surprise,
And you never saw the tears in her eyes."

(1) How did the mother deal with a stranger? 
(2) What do you learn from this extract? 
(3) Give the rhyming pairs of words from the extract. (Any two)
(4) Pick out the line from the extract suggesting the mother's
insensitive behavior towards her daughter.

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: 
The banyan tree was three times as tall as our house
Its trunk had a circumference of fifty feet
Its scraggly aerial roots fell to the ground
From thirty feet or more so first they cut the branches
Sawing them off for seven days and the heap was huge
Insects and birds began to leave the tree
And then they came to its massive trunk 
Fifty men with axes chopped and chopped
The great tree revealed its rings of two hundred years
We watched in terror and fascination this slaughter
As a raw mythology revealed to us its age

(1) What were the feelings of the family members at the felling of the banyan tree?
(2) Why, according to you, did insects and birds begin to leave the banyan tree? 
(3) Find out an example of 'Repetition' from the extract.
(4) Pick out the line from the extract expressing the feelings of the people who watched the merciless cutting of the banyan
tree.

Composition :
Rewrite the story extract as if Oliver is the narrator.
[ You may begin as: "I had no knowledge of where my brother was ..... "]

        Oliver, therefore, had no knowledge of where his brother was, but Frederick refused to believe this. 'You have not seen him since the wrestling match!' he said disbelievingly. 'Sir, sir, that cannot be! You must find your brother, wherever he is. Do not dare to come back without him! If you do not bring him to me, dead or alive, within the year. I will take all your land and possessions and you will not be allowed to live anywhere within my dukedom'.
       And so Oliver also set out for the forest of Arden, in search of his brother Orlando. Rosalind and Celia. with the faithful Touchstone, wandered through the forest for many days. They grew so tired and hungry that they felt they could go on no longer in search of Rosalind's father, but at last they met a shepherd who told them that his master had a cottage for sale. They thankfully
bought the cottage and lived there, wandering through the forest every day and returning to the little house at night.
       Although Rosalind did not know it, her father was not very far away. He and the faithful lords who had accompanied him were happily settled in the forest. They had grown to love the simple
life they led. They found it safer and more sweet than the life of
the court, where people were often greedy and jealous and cruel.
They had enough food for their needs because they could 'hunt
the deer in the forest and grow their own fruit and vegetables.
They were full of contentment and good cheer.

Read the following extract and convert it into a continuous writeup.
[ You may begin with: "The writer's mother asked the pink lady if she required a room ..... "]
"May I come in?" asked the pink lady.
"Please come in," said my mother."Do sit down. Do you require
a room?"
"Not today, thank you. I'm staying with Padre Dutt. He insisted on putting me up. But I may want a room for a day or two - just for old times' sake."
"You've stayed here before."
"A long time ago. I'm Mrs. Green, you know. The missing Mrs
Green. The one for whom you put up that handsome tombstone in the cemetery. I was very touched by it. And I'm glad you didn't add 'Beloved wife of Henry Green' because I didn't love him any more than he loved me."
"Then - then - you aren't the skeleton?" stammered my mother.
"Do I look like a skeleton?"
"No!" we said together.
"But we heard you disappeared," I said, "and when we found that skeleton -"
"You put two and two together.''
"Well, it was Miss Kellner who convinced us," said my mother.
"And you did disappear mysteriously. You were missing for years. And everyone knew Mr. Green was a philanderer." "Couldn't wait to get away from him," said the pink lady."Couldn't stand him anymore. He was a lady-killer, but not a real killer."
"But your father came looking for you. Didn't you get in touch
with him?"
"My father and I were never very close. Mother died when I was
very young, and the only relative I had was a cousin in West Africa. So that's where I went- Sierra Leone!''

Extend the given extract by adding an imaginary paragraph of your own (about 120 words):
         The lark bent its little head towards the flower, and its heart broke for want and longing. The flower could not, as on the previous evening. fold up its petals and sleep; it dropped sorrowfully. The boys only came the next morning; when they saw the dead bird. they began to cry bitterly, dug a nice grave for it. and adorned it with flowers. The bird's body was placed in a pretty red box; they wished to bury it with royal honours. While it was alive and sang they forgot it. and let it suffer want in the cage: now. they cried over it and covered it with flowers. The piece of turf. with the little daisy in it, was thrown out on the dusty highway. Nobody thought of the flower which had felt so much for the bird and had so greatly desired to comfort it.

Mr. Manoj S. Patil, age 26, M.Tech, Electrical from 'Manas', Om Colony, Vidhyavihar, Nagpur wants to apply in response to the following advertisement. Prepare a job application.

You intend to make a general awareness among people about the hazardous effects of plastic carry-bags.

Write a letter to the Editors of a newspaper Highlighting the improper disposal of plastic carry-bags and also suggest some solutions to solve this problem.

Prepare a short tourist leaflet on any hill-station you have visited with the held of points given below:

(i) How to reach there?

(ii) Accommodation.

(iii) Worth-seeing places.

(iv) Specialties.

(v) Add your own points. 

Write a report about the celebration of the 'Republic Day' at your college.

Read the following tree-diagram and prepare a short paragraph regarding 'Soil Erosion'. 

Prepare a paragraph to be used for the counter view-section on the following topic:

"There should be a dress-code for Junior College students."
You can take the help of the following points in the view-section.

The election of your village ‘Gram Panchayat’ is just over. You have to take an interview of the newly elected ‘Sarpanch’. Frame at least 8 questions related to his future planning for the welfare of your village.

You are the captain of your college cricket team. You have your final match on Sunday. Your teammates are nervous. Prepare a speech motivating them to face the challenge courageously. (About 100 words)