Questions

1) Why is it worthwhile to learn to swim?

2) How many styles are there in swimming?

3) Where was swimming practiced as a sport?

4) When did swimming become very popular?

5) Was swimming as a sport popular in Russia?

6) What famous Soviet swimmers do you know?

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TOOL

A tool is a device that can be used to produce an item or achieve a task, but that is not consumed in the process. Informally the word is also used to describe a procedure or process with a specific purpose. Tools that are used in particular fields or activities may have different designations such as Instrument, Utensil, Implement, Machine, or Apparatus.

Anthropologists believe that the use of tools was an important step in the evolution of mankind. Humans evolved an opposable thumb - useful in holding tools - and increased dramatically in intelligence, which aided in the use of tools. Because tools are used extensively by both humans and wild chimpanzees, it is widely assumed that the first routine use of tools took place prior to the divergence between the two species. These early tools, however, were likely made of perishable materials such as sticks, or consisted of unmodified stones that cannot be distinguished from other stones as tools. The beginning of the Stone Age marks the era when hominins first began manufacturing stone tools, and evidence of these tools dates back at least 2.6 million years in Ethiopia. One of the earliest distinguishable stone tool forms is the hand axe.

Tools are the most important items that the ancient humans used to climb to the top of the food chain; by inventing tools, they were able to accomplish tasks that human bodies could not, such as using a spear or bow and arrow to kill prey, since their teeth were not sharp enough to pierce many animals' skins.

The transition from stone to metal tools roughly coincided with the development of agriculture around the 4th millennium BC. Mechanical devices experienced a major expansion in their use in the Middle Ages with the systematic employment of new energy sources: water (waterwheels) and wind (windmills).

Machine tools occasioned a surge in producing new tools in the industrial revolution. Advocates of nanotechnology expect a similar surge as tools become microscopic in size.

Questions

1) What is a tool?

2) When did the first routine use of tools take place?

3) Why are tools the most important items?

4) What occasioned the industrial revolution?

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Текст № 1

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