You are Ankita staying at 35, Palam Street, Nagpur. You recently attended a seminar on ‘Effective Listening Skills’ and found it to be of great value. Write a letter to your friend, Anita in 100-120 words, giving details of the seminar and sharing what you learned in the seminar. You can use the points given below: 5

*Venue and participants

* Listening is as important as speaking

* Listening—a tool in good communication

*Builds concentration

* Important for a student

Read the passage given below:

The Perfect Dog

1. In the summer of 1967, when I was 10 years old, my father caved into my persistent pleas and took me to get my own dog. Together we drove in the family station wagon far into the Michigan countryside to a farm run by a rough-hewn woman and her ancient mother. The farm produced just one commodity — dogs. Dogs of every imaginable size and shape and age and temperament. They had only two things in common: each was a mongrel of unknown and distinct ancestry and each was free to a good home.

2. I quickly decided the older dogs were somebody else’s charity case. I immediately raced to the puppy cage. “You want to pick one that’s not timid,” my father coached. “Try rattling the cage and see which ones aren’t afraid.”

3. I grabbed the chain-link gate and yanked on it with a loud clang. The dozen or so puppies reeled backward, collapsing on top of one another in a squiggling heap of fur. Just one remained. He was gold with a white blaze on his chest, and he charged at the gate, yapping fearlessly. He jumped up and excitedly licked my fingers through the fencing. It was love at first sight.

4. I brought him home in a cardboard box and named him Shaun. He was one of those dogs that gives dogs a good name. He effortlessly mastered every command I taught him and was naturally well behaved. I could drop a crust on the floor and he would not touch it until I gave the okay.

5. Relatives would visit for the weekend and returned home determined to buy a dog of their own, so impressed were they with Shaun—or “Saint Shaun,” as I came to call him. Boom with the curse of an uncertain lineage, he was one of the tens of thousands of unwanted dogs in America. Yet by some stroke of almost providential good fortune, he became wanted. He came into my life and I into his—and in the process, he gave me the childhood every kid deserves.

6. The love affair lasted fourteen years and by the time he died I was no longer the little boy who had brought him along on that summer day. I was a man, out of college and working across the state in my first real job. Saint Shaun had stayed behind when I moved on. It was where he belonged. My parents, by then retired, called to break the news to me. My mother would later tell me, “In fifty years of marriage, I’ve only seen your father cry twice. The first time was when we lost Mary Ann” — my sister, who was stillborn. “The second time was the day Shaun died.”

7. Saint Shaun of my childhood. He was a perfect dog. At least that’s how I will always remember him. It was Shaun who set the standard by which I would judge all other dogs to come. ‘ (Marley and Me by John Grogan)

On the basis of your reading of the passage, answer the following questions briefly:

(a) What commodity did the farm produce? Which two things were common in each of these commodities?

(b) How did the author decide which puppy he wanted to take home from the dog farm?

(c) Why was Shaun one of those dogs that give dogs a good name?

(d) On what two instances did the author’s father cry?

Read the passage given below:

The Perfect Dog

1. In the summer of 1967, when I was 10 years old, my father caved into my persistent pleas and took me to get my own dog. Together we drove in the family station wagon far into the Michigan countryside to a farm run by a rough-hewn woman and her ancient mother. The farm produced just one commodity — dogs. Dogs of every imaginable size and shape and age and temperament. They had only two things in common: each was a mongrel of unknown and distinct ancestry and each was free to a good home.

2. I quickly decided the older dogs were somebody else’s charity case. I immediately raced to the puppy cage. “You want to pick one that’s not timid,” my father coached. “Try rattling the cage and see which ones aren’t afraid.”

3. I grabbed the chain-link gate and yanked on it with a loud clang. The dozen or so puppies reeled backward, collapsing on top of one another in a squiggling heap of fur. Just one remained. He was gold with a white blaze on his chest, and he charged at the gate, yapping fearlessly. He jumped up and excitedly licked my fingers through the fencing. It was love at first sight.

4. I brought him home in a cardboard box and named him Shaun. He was one of those dogs that gives dogs a good name. He effortlessly mastered every command I taught him and was naturally well behaved. I could drop a crust on the floor and he would not touch it until I gave the okay.

5. Relatives would visit for the weekend and returned home determined to buy a dog of their own, so impressed were they with Shaun—or “Saint Shaun,” as I came to call him. Boom with the curse of an uncertain lineage, he was one of the tens of thousands of unwanted dogs in America. Yet by some stroke of almost providential good fortune, he became wanted. He came into my life and I into his—and in the process, he gave me the childhood every kid deserves.

6. The love affair lasted fourteen years and by the time he died I was no longer the little boy who had brought him along on that summer day. I was a man, out of college and working across the state in my first real job. Saint Shaun had stayed behind when I moved on. It was where he belonged. My parents, by then retired, called to break the news to me. My mother would later tell me, “In fifty years of marriage, I’ve only seen your father cry twice. The first time was when we lost Mary Ann” — my sister, who was stillborn. “The second time was the day Shaun died.”

7. Saint Shaun of my childhood. He was a perfect dog. At least that’s how I will always remember him. It was Shaun who set the standard by which I would judge all other dogs to come. ‘ (Marley and Me by John Grogan)

Choose the most appropriate meaning of the given word from the options provided

(a) The word ‘pleas’ means

(i) to please someone (ii) noticeable

(iii) urgent request (iv) a command

(b)The word ‘collapsing’ means

(i) falling (ii) lying (iii) climbing (iv) declining

(c) The word ‘lineage’ means

(i) lining up (ii) descent from an ancestor

(iii) forefathers (iv) move forward

(d) The word ‘retired’ means

(i)to get tired (ii) withdraw from one’s work

(iii) to get hurt (iv) join work

Write-an article in about 100-120 words on ‘River pollution.’

You may use the clues given below:

* rivers, the biggest source of water

* victims of pollution

* industrial waste

* city waste drained into them

* religious ceremonies—idol immersion

* garlands and flowers

* ashes after cremation poured into rivers

Complete the given story in 150-200 words.

It was an unusual instance. Mr. Subramanium was late for his lecture. He hurried to his room and saw a peon dusting the table by putting all the articles of his table to one side. Mr. Subramanium mistook him for a thief who had come to steal the office property ——.