TANJONG KATONG SECONDARY SCHOOL

Preliminary Examination 2023

Secondary 4

CANDIDATE
NAME

CLASS INDEX NUMBER

ENGLISH LANGUAGE 1184/02

Paper 2 Comprehension 11 August 2023

INSERT 1 hour 50 minutes

READ THESE INSTRUCTIONS FIRST

This Insert contains Text 1, Text 2, Text 3 and Text 4.

This document consists of 6 printed pages and 2 blank pages.

[Turn over
2

Section A
Text 1

Study the online advertisement (Text 1) and the social media post (Text 2) and answer Questions 1 – 4
in the Question Paper.

Text 1 is taken from an online advertisement for fair and progressive employment practices.

IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOUR

PARENTS OR GRANDPARENTS
TOO.

This could happen to anyone.

Assuming that one’s age will affect work performance and desire for career advancement is a bias that
prevents people with the right skills and commitment from contributing at work.

It's time we put a stop to workplace discrimination by knowing and acting on them fast. Together, let’s
do our part to create a fair and inclusive workplace for all.

Text 2 is taken from a social media post.

Today, I become a victim of the greatest injustice in my life. After dedicating decades of my life to the
company I loved, I find myself pushed aside like a discarded relic! Age should be celebrated, not used
against us. This fight isn't just for myself; it's for all the elderly workers out there who face the same
prejudice and indignities. We have a right to be respected, and to be valued. Such injustice could
happen to anyone. Let’s not back down until change happens! To the company that let me go: you
might think you've gotten rid of an ‘old’ problem, but you've ignited a fire within me and many others!
#victim #stopworkplacediscrimination #oldbutstilluseful
3

Section B
Text 3

The text below describes a visit by Stephen and his three-year-old daughter to the supermarket where
she went missing. Read the text carefully and answer Questions 5 - 13 in the Question Booklet.

1 In the hall Kate came towards him, holding up the scuffed toy donkey. He bent to loop the red scarf
twice around her neck before they stepped outdoors onto the street, as though into a storm. The main
road was an arterial route south; its traffic rushed with ferocity. It was a two-minute walk to the
supermarket, over the four-lane road by a zebra crossing. They made their way across at last, in front
of a pack of cars which snarled and roared forward the moment they reached the other side. Stephen 5
held Kate’s hand tightly as they weaved among the flux of shoppers towards the entrance. Amid voices,
shouts, and the electro-mechanical rattle at the checkout counters, they found a trolley. Chattering
excitedly, Kate made herself comfortable in her seat.

2 The people who frequented the supermarket divided into groups as distinct as tribes. There were young
childless couples who thought nothing of splurging on fanciful desserts. Then there were the retirees 10
poring over food labels. Another group consisted of young mothers pushing prams. There were also
domestic helpers, shopping lists in hand, purposeful in their strides. Fathers like Stephen, child in tow,
were an anomaly. Moving between the aisles, his eyes darted rapidly, trying to locate the items he
needed - toothpaste, detergent, a leg of lamb, eggs and potatoes. Kate tugged at his sleeve, trying to
get his attention as he navigated the labyrinth of aisles and milling shoppers. He glanced down at her 15
and winked. She copied him, but clumsily, wrinkling her nose and closing both eyes.

3 Fifteen minutes later they were at the checkout and he joined a queue nearest the entrance. There
were three people ahead of him when he stopped the trolley and there was no one behind him when
he turned to lift Kate from it. She relished being on her ‘throne’ and loathed being disturbed. She
whined and clung stubbornly on to her seat, causing him to lift her high to get her out. By the time this 20
little tug-of-war was over, there was only one person ahead of them. He came round to the front of the
trolley to unload his items onto the conveyor belt. Kate remained at the other end of the trolley, her
little hands stretching longingly to touch the trolley seat. There was no one behind her. Now the man
immediately ahead of Stephen was about to pay for several tins of dog food. Stephen lifted the first
item onto the belt and as he straightened, he might have been conscious of a figure in a dark coat 25
behind Kate. But it was hardly an awareness at all. The coat could have been a dress or a shopping
bag or his own invention. He was intent on ordinary tasks, keen to finish them, and all about him shapes
without definition drifted and dissolved, blending into the surroundings.

4 The man with the dog food was leaving. The cashier was already at work, her fingers flickering over
the keypad as she checked out Stephen’s items. Setting his last item on the belt, Stephen asked the 30
girl for a carrier bag. She reached under a shelf and pulled one out. He took it and turned. Kate was
gone. No one was behind the trolley. Unhurriedly and calmly, he pushed the trolley clear, thinking she
had ducked down behind the end of the counter. Then he took a few paces and glanced down the only
aisle she would have had time to reach. He stepped back and looked expectantly to his left and right.
On one side there were lines of shoppers, on the other a clear space, then the automatic doors on to 35
the pavement. There may have been a figure in a coat hurrying away from him, but at that time Stephen
was only looking for a three-year-old child, and his immediate worry was the traffic.

5 This was a theoretical, precautionary anxiety. As he shouldered past shoppers and emerged on to the
broad pavement he knew he would not see her there. Kate was not adventurous in this way. She was
also not a strayer, preferring to be in the company of people she was familiar with. Convinced that she 40
had to be in the shop, and could come to no real harm there, he turned back. He expected to see her
emerging from behind the lines of shoppers at the checkouts. It was easy enough to overlook a child
in the first flash of concern, to look too hard, too quickly. Still, a sickness and a tightening at the base
of the throat, an unpleasant lightness in the feet, were with him as he went back. He walked past all
the checkouts, ignoring the girl at his who was irritably trying to attract his attention. 45

6 He went down all the aisles, past mountains or oranges, toilet rolls, soup. It was not until he was back
at his starting point that he abandoned all propriety. He was taking long strides, bawling her name as
he pounded the length of an aisle, pushing shoppers out of his way. Faces were turning towards him.
4

There was no mistaking him for one of the drunks who blundered in to buy alcohol. His fear was
overwhelming; it was too evident, too raw, too forceful; and it filled the impersonal, fluorescent space 50
with unignorable human warmth. Within moments all shopping around him had ceased. Baskets and
trollies were set aside, people were converging and saying Kate’s name and somehow, in no time at
all, it was generally known that she was three, that she was last seen at the checkout, that she wore
green dungarees and carried a toy donkey.

Adapted from The Child in Time by Ian McEwan

5

Section C
Text 4

The text below is about a deadly fungus infection. Read the text carefully and answer Questions 14 – 19
in the Question Booklet.

1 ‘The Last of Us’, a sci-fi/horror television series based on the video game of the same name, takes
place in a world ravaged by a fungus that kills anyone it infects, but not before turning them into
mindless, zombie-like monsters driven to attack anyone who remains uninfected. 20 years after the
outbreak, the only remnants of civilisation are brutally oppressive ‘Quarantine Zones’ and scattered
survivor settlements. 5

2 What is the fungus and what are its effects? Where did the outbreak start? How did it spread so fast
that the world was overwhelmed? Is there a cure? The fungus, referred to in the show only as
‘cordyceps’, is a fictional, mutated form of the real-life Ophiocordyceps Unilateralis, a fungal infection
found in tropical locations. It also has the unfortunately apt nickname ‘zombie ant fungus’. Researchers
think the fungus infects a foraging ant through spores that attach to and penetrate the exoskeleton, as 10
if inserting a syringe and injecting its contents. Thereafter, rather like how a human becomes a
zombified creature against his will in the show, the fungus slowly takes over its host’s behaviour. At
this point, the ant may not even know that it is infected. As the infection advances, the enthralled ant
is forced to leave its nest for a more humid microclimate that is favourable to the fungus’s growth. The
ant is compelled to descend to a vantage point about 10 inches off the ground, sink its jaws into a leaf 15
vein on the north side of a plant, and wait for death. In essence, the ant is primed to be the fungus’s
instrument of propagation when it is ready.

3 As the ant is dying, the fungus feeds on its victim’s innards until it is time for the final stage. Shockingly,
scientists have found that the fungus never actually infects the ant’s brain. It seems like a fate worse
than death to be infected with something that robs one of any control over one’s body while being 20
completely aware of every agonising moment. Several days after the ant has died, the fungus sends
a fruiting body out through the base of the ant’s head. In a matter of hours, its shrivelled corpse
becomes a launchpad from which it can jettison its spores – like a cannon – and infect new ants. As in
zombie lore, there is an incubation period where infected ants appear perfectly normal and go about
their business undetected by the rest of the colony. Social insects like ants usually have something 25
called social immunity – sick members get kicked out of the group to prevent the rest from getting sick
too. However, in this case, there is no way for the other ants to react to the threat until it is too late to
do anything. This is what makes the behaviour of the fungus so insidious.

4 In actual fact, unlike on ‘The Last of Us’, the infected ant does not suddenly start attacking other ants
either. The goal is not to convert all the ants into the walking dead. For ecosystems to stay balanced, 30
fungi must keep host populations in check. In fact, only a few ants in a colony are infected at any given
time, which helps to keep the fungus spreading unnoticed, with a ready pool of unsuspecting hosts
being none the wiser. However, it must be noted that the infection is 100 percent lethal.

5 Moreover, the ‘zombie ant fungus’ featured in the television series only infects insects in real life. How
do the fungi manage to infect human beings in the show? The prologue of the first episode of ‘The 35
Last of Us’ has the answer. It opens with the broadcast of a late 1960s chat show, where learned
guests are discussing potential risks to the survival of humanity. One of the guests, a scientist,
dismisses the suggestion that viruses or bacteria are the bigger threat, arguing instead that we should
be worried about fungi. Ominously, he points out that fungi may seem harmless, but actually seek to
control and not to kill, as fungi can alter our very minds. He also warns that fungi can be more resistant 40
to antibiotics than viruses and bacteria.

6 Scientific research in the real world has shown that human bodies are too warm for such fungi to
survive. In order for the show’s nightmarish – and far-fetched – scenario to really happen, the world’s
temperature must rise to the point that fungi have to evolve to withstand the hotter climate, leading to
gene mutation. Should that happen, it will enable one strain to become capable of burrowing into 45
human brains and taking control of millions of people. Only then will there be countless puppets with
poisoned minds permanently fixed on one unifying goal – to spread the infection to every last human
alive, by any means necessary.
6

7 In short, it will take extreme global warming to create the necessary conditions for the fungus to mutate
into a form that can infect humans. 50

Adapted from ‘The Last of Us’:

Everything to Know About the Fungus That Transforms People Into Zombies
www.thewrap.com
and
How a parasitic fungus turns ants into 'zombies'
www.nationalgeographic.com