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READER’S DIGEST
CLASSROOM
FEBRUARY
BEGINNER
YOUR RESOURCE
FOR ENGLISH
COMPREHENSION AND
CREATIVE TASKS
Editors’ Note
Welcome to RD Classroom
LEARNING A LANGUAGE is a lifetime commitment, so every chance you
have to expand your English skills will help. That’s why we’ve developed
RD Classroom, to turn your favourite magazine into a textbook.
To use this special guide, you’ll need a copy of the February 2016
edition of Asia Reader’s Digest. Don’t worry if you missed it at the
newsagency, you can go to rdasia.com and call the customer service
numbers at the top left to order a copy.
This month, our stories include ‘Know Better’ – all the latest research
on how to improve your ability to learn, ‘Powerful Ways to Use Body
Language’, where you’ll learn
that gesturing with both hands
helps creativity and much
more, and ‘Under Pressure’,
about the most creative ways to
get rid of stress.
We’ve included a set of
questions and activities for
each story to help you test your
comprehension. Answer sheets
will be uploaded at the start of
March, along with the next
edition of RD Classroom.
Contact us on social media
and tell us what you would
like to learn about next!
Contents
What you’ll find
4 QUESTIONS FOR ‘KNOW BETTER’
From pages 66-73 in Reader’s Digest February 2016. From eating fish
to teaching empathy, the latest research on learning.
5 QUESTIONS FOR ‘POWERFUL WAYS TO USE BODY
LANGUAGE’
From pages 81-82 in Reader’s Digest February 2016.
6 QUESTIONS FOR ‘UNDER PRESSURE’
From pages 83-85 in Reader’s Digest February 2016. Take out your
frustrations in ways that won’t hurt.
7 WORD HELP
Explanations of difficult words from this month’s stories.
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The Editors
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QUESTIONS QUESTIONS FOR ‘KNOW BETTER’ (PAGE 66)
1. Dr Cyrus Raji states that humans became smarter when they
settled close to rivers. What reasons are suggested for this? Do
these reasons make sense to you?
2. Why might writing notes and letters using pen and paper
instead of a computer be better for people? Which do you
prefer? Why?
3. Smoking is bad for you for many reasons but the article
suggests it may also be bad for your brain. Why is this? Can a
person change this if they stop smoking?
4. Is physical exercise helpful for the brain and why? What useful
exercise tips does the article give the reader?
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QUESTIONS FOR ‘POWERFUL WAYS TO USE BODY
LANGUAGE’ (PAGE 81)
1. What do you think the term ‘body language’ means?
2. What did a University of Maryland study discover about
different types of voice? How is this discovery useful when
dealing with young children?
3. How long does physical contact with another person need to
last to create a human bond?
4. Why would a low-pitched voice make listeners think that you
were feeling confident and unstressed?
5. How should you hold your chin to convince someone that you
are making a sincere apology? Why?
ACTIVITY The writer tells us why coffee may be good for your
long-term memory. Create a poster explaining to people how
coffee may be good for them. Use the positive points in the
article to help you convince people to drink a cup of coffee.
ACTIVITY Try using one or more of the powerful body language
suggestions listed in the story. Did it change the way you felt?
Did it change the way people reacted to you? Write a paragraph
or two about your experience.
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QUESTIONS QUESTIONS FOR ‘UNDER PRESSURE’ (PAGE 83)
1. What does the writer of the article say the internet provides?
What do these two qualities facilitate (make easier)?
2. ‘Venting’ can be good for a person but perhaps not online.
Why is this? What is suggested as the alternative?
3. Is exercise useful for helping people who are frustrated? Why?
WORD HELP
KNOW BETTER
Neuron A specialised cell in the body that transmits nerve
impulses. You have neurons all through your body, not just in your
brain. All of your thoughts, your senses and the movements of your
body rely on neurons.
Virtuoso An expert or genius at a particular skill. This word is
mostly used to describe someone particularly talented at music
or in the arts.
Innate This word means natural, or inborn, and is used to describe
some quality that did not need to be learned or practised.
Analogue This is one of those words that used to have a single
specific meaning, but now has a number of new meanings, too.
Here, it means ‘not digital’, so your old record or tape player is
analogue and writing a letter is an analogue version of email.
Sensorimotor Using both the senses and the motor functions
of the body. These are the parts of the brain that combine the
information we take in about the world. Hand-eye coordination
is an example of a sensorimotor skill.
4. What do you understand the term ‘self distancing’ to mean?
How does this help you to deal with stress and anger? Is a
thought such as my friend is angry, but I think she is mostly angry
that she is running late, not that I ordered a cold drink without her
an example of self-distancing?
Narcissist Someone who is exceptionally vain and admiring of
their own self, usually to the exclusion of other people. The word
comes from the Greek myth of Narcissus, a beautiful but selfabsorbed young man who fell in love with his face reflected in
a pool of water. He spent so long staring at his reflection that
he eventually died.
ACTIVITY Everyone becomes stressed, angry and frustrated at
times. Think of a time when you became frustrated and didn’t act
in the best way you could have. After reading the article, what
could you have done instead to help or what might you try in the
future to help yourself or someone else?
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Empathy The ability to understand and share the feelings of
another person.
Workaround A useful trick or technique to overcome a difficult
problem. ‘My door would not stay shut, but I came up with a
workaround using cardboard in the doorjamb.’
Callous Insensitive and cruel. Do not confuse this word with
callus, which means a thick and hardened patch of skin.
Herculean This is an adjective – a describing word – that means
requiring or having great strength or effort. It comes from the
mythological figure Hercules who was famed for his strength.
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READER’S DIGEST
Mnemonic A pattern of letters or words formulated as an aid to
memory. So the notes that fill the spaces in the treble stave of a
sheet of music are FACE, F, A, C and E. For the bass stave, they
can be remembered by the mnemonic phrase All Cows Eat Grass:
A, C, E and G.
Placebo A substance given as a medicine that has no intrinsic
effect. Placebos are used in medical studies, where one group is
given placebos to contrast with another group who receive an
active medicine. The differences are then studied. They are also
sometimes used where an active medicine could cause more
harm than good and a psychological boost might be all the
patient needs. When this happens, the patient is usually told that
it is a surprisingly effective and safe medicine.
Phonetically Of speech sounds. So you might phonetically spell
out a complicated word such as antidisestablishmentariansim.
By breaking it down into smaller parts (anti-dis-est and so on), it
becomes much easier. But this does not work for words such as
knight, which 700 years ago was pronounced more like ‘ker-nicht’
but is now simply pronounced ‘nite’.
POWERFUL WAYS TO USE BODY LANGUAGE
Body language We use this term to describe any communication
that is done by the posture of the body and expressions of the
face. It can be friendly (for example, open arms and a smile) or shy
(hiding away and hunching over to make yourself seem smaller).
The other term for body language is ‘non-verbal communication’,
meaning the message is conveyed without words.
Significant other This is an informal term that has become
popular in English. It means any person who is in a close romantic
relationship with you, usually a husband, wife, boyfriend or
girlfriend. It can also be used in a humorous or non-serious way
to refer to close friends and house mates, so you might say: “My
significant other is my flatmate, and he was very upset when I
went out to lunch with a girl instead of playing football with him.”
Oxytocin A hormone that is produced naturally in the brain. It is
sometimes called the ‘trust hormone’, and it plays an important
role in social bonding.
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QUESTIONS Cortisol Another hormone that is produced naturally, in this case
in the adrenal glands. It is released in response to stress.
Brainstorming A group discussion to produce ideas.
Persuasively In a convincing manner. Someone who speaks
persuasively might be seen as more trustworthy, or a better
candidate for a job.
UNDER PRESSURE
Umpteen This is an informal word that means ‘many’, or an
uncountable number. You will frequently hear it being used with
a th on the end: Lin shouted, “For the umpteenth time, Lee, do
the dishes!”
Metastudy A metastudy brings together separate but related
studies and subjects them to new analysis or looks at the data
with different statistical tools. It is also called a meta-analysis.
Altercations Noisy arguments or disagreements.
Tempering This word comes from blacksmiths and others who
work with metal and originally described a process of treating
a piece of metal to make it harder. Now it is used more widely to
describe making a thing or person stronger or more resilient.
Anagrams A word or phrase formed by rearranging the letters of
another word or phrase: ‘meat balls’ is an anagram of ‘stale lamb’.
DID YOU KNOW?
n Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and the Indus Valley are three of
the areas where human civilisation first formed significant large
settlements. These cultures invented the city, writing and other
basics of our world. Ancient Egypt arose in the Nile Valley, where
annual floods created excellent farming lands. The Pyramids
and Sphinx date back to this civilisation. Mesopotamia stretched
across what is now Iraq, Syria and Kuwait, between the Tigris and
Euphrates rivers. It is the civilisation that brought us the wheel and
much of modern agriculture and mathematics. The Indus Valley
civilisation was located in modern-day Pakistan and India, around
the Indus River, and invented city planning and plumbing, along
with an elegant writing system that scholars still can’t decipher.
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