Sample Paper  – 2010
Subject –Functional English(SET-1)
Class XII

                   M.M: 100m                                                                                                          Time:  3 hrs

General instructions:

1. The paper contains four sections; Sections A, B, C and D. All the sections are compulsory.
2. Read the questions carefully before answering.
3. Marks will be deducted for exceeding word limit and for illegible, untidy presentation.
4. There are six printed pages.

SECTION A: READING

Q.1. Read the passage given below and then answer the questions which follow:             

Indians, it seems, are becoming more aware of the positive side to staying fit.  What exactly is being fit all about: a good body or stamina? More than ten years ago, when Jane Fonda and her aerobics hit the world, the refrain was losing weight and having a Fonda figure – trim thighs, taut belly and shapely arms and hips.

Fitness then meant being slim.  Today the word has taken on a wider connotation.  A body with hard, firm muscles and no fat can be one of the signs of being fit, but it’s no longer just about looking good.  Feeling good is equally important. “Do understand,” explains Dr. Prabha Sanghi of Pulse Impulse, a fitness and health centre, “that all overweight are not obese and vice-versa.”

Obesity stems from other reasons than just eating too much. “In India eating is a matter of habit.  If the family has been eating cereals four times a day or four bananas every morning, they will continue to do so without bothering to find out about the calories they’re taking in. When you visit someone and are offered food, your refusal may offend the host.  So you eat.  Over indulgent mothers think ghee-soaked paranthas is what their children need. People also eat when they’re stressed,” Then, when they become overweight, they resort to fat suction and weight loss through machines, fad diets, protein powders, etc.

However, says Dr. Anjali Mukherjee of Health Total, people are realizing the harmful effect of these techniques.  They are now moving towards long-term and healthy ways of remaining fit.  And these ways are increasingly becoming personalized.

“Holistic health plans, corrective dietary / nutritive patterns and moderation in everything is becoming the new age mind-set, which is the correct attitude to fitness,” she says.  “The only healthy way to stay fit is to follow an individual-specific diet lifestyle and exercise pattern.  Each individual is unique in terms of body constitution and assessed on different parameters.  For

instance, diabetes, which is commonly understood as hereditary, occur due to eating excessive sweets. An abusive lifestyle, drinking and stress prepones the incidence by 20 years.”

 The past few years have thrown up a lot of new options – in both exercising and nutrition, both of which go hand in hand.  If nutrition is inadequate, the body doesn’t reap the benefits of exercise.  “You are what you eat,’ said Hippocrates. That explains it all, says Dr. Mukherjee. “Diet forms a basic pillar of support for correcting and preventing most medical problems.”

“The selection of food makes a lot of difference,” adds Dr.Mukherjee… “If you’re body-building, you need to have more protein and carbohydrates to get enough energy for workouts.  You also need multivitamins to transport these nutrients properly.  Different diets are needed to derive the full benefit of different sports.”

 For instance, those into weight training should have a banana, whole-wheat bread sandwich, fruit and milk shake before going to the gym, as carbohydrates before exercising are used as fuel so that the muscle protein is conserved. Those into aerobics and swimming should eat a carbohydrate diet like bran bread / bran roti, banana, pasta and fruits. It’s just a question of forming the right food habits to complement the exercises you do.

 The options in exercise are many – walking, sport, the gym or even working out at home. Also, no single exercise takes care of all aspects of fitness equally.  So having the option of more than one activity to turn to keeps exercise from becoming monotonous.

The once-trendy aerobics has given way to the well-equipped gym.  People prefer the treadmill or the stepper and the younger lot like the weights for muscle building.  Of course there is a whole set of people who swear by their daily walks.  “The fresh air and the time one gets alone to introspect cannot happen while working on the treadmill or the stepper,” says Suresh Chaudhary, a corporate executive.  “It is an addiction.  Even when I am travelling, I refuse to miss my daily walk.”

Yoga, too, is a big fitness movement as it takes care of physical, mental and spiritual fitness.  “Yoga is a wholesome exercise,” says Bharat Thakur who’s been teaching it for several years now, both in-groups and individually. “It works on all aspects of fitness like strength, endurance, flexibility, coordination ability and agility.  It reduces weight, tones the body, makes the skin glow, improves memory and concentration, rids joints pain, and keeps you fresh the whole day.”

 Good hair, great skin, a toned body, high energy levels and a balanced mind all are indicators of a fit person. That, and the absence of any medical problems.  For, at the end of the day, quality of life is what we are all looking for.  And fitness is an inseparable part of the quality of life.

1.1 Based on your understanding of the passage answer the following questions:             9m

• How has the concept of fitness changed over the years?                      1m
• How are overweight and obesity related?                      1m
• What techniques do overweight people adopt to shed weight?                  1m

• What alternative is preferable? Why?                      1m
• How is the selection of food vital for fitness?                      2m
• Why is Yoga preferred to other exercises?         2m
• Enumerate the indicators of a fit person?                      1m

1.2 Find words from the passage which mean the same as each of the following:        (1×3=3)

(i)  Often repeated comment. (para 1)

(ii) An idea suggested by a word in addition to its main meaning. (para 6)

(iii) Something that decides or limits the way in which something can be done (para 7)

2. 2. Read the passage given below and answer the questions that follow:    8m

Do children really need such long summer breaks, was a question posed by some experts recently. Apparently, such a long break disrupts their development and comes in the way of their learning process. Let’s get them back to their books, is perhaps the expert view, if not in so many words. One would have thought the children are doing too much during their vacations and not too little, given the plethora of classes, camps and workshops involving swimming, art, personality development, music, computers and the like that seem to cram their calendar. Even the trips taken in the name of holidays seem laden with exotic destinations and customized experience packed into a short period of time. We can do Europe in ten days and Australia in a week and come back armed with digital memories and overflowing suitcases. Holidays are in some ways, no longer a break but an intensified search for experience not normally encountered in everyday life.

It is a far cry from summer holidays one experienced while growing up. For holidays every year meant one thing and one thing alone—— you went back to your native place logged in with the emotional headquarters of your extended family and spent two months with a gaggle of uncles, aunts and first and second cousins. The happiest memories of the childhood of a whole generation seem to be centered around this annual ritual of homecoming and of affirmation. We tendered tacit apologies for the separateness entailed in being individuals even as we scurried back into the cauldron of community represented by family. Summer vacation was a time sticky with oneness, as who we were and what we owned oozed out from our individual selves into a collective pot.

Summer was not really a break, but a joint. It was the bridge used to reaffirm one’s connectedness with one’s connectedness with one’s larger community. One did not travel, one returned. It was not an attempt to experience the new and the extraordinary but one that emphatically underlined the power of the old and the ordinary. As times change, what we seek from our summer breaks too has changed in a fundamental way. Today, we are attached much more to work and summer helps us temporarily detach from this new source of identity. We refuel our individual selves now; and do so with much more material than we did in the past. But for those who grew up in different times, summer was the best time of their lives.                                                                                                             (418 words)

                                                                                                                                                       Source: The Times of India

2.1 Make notes of the above passage using an acceptable format including abbreviations, with suitable titles.                 2.2 Make a summary of the above passage in not more than 80 words.

SECTION B: ADVANCED WRITING SKILLS

3. Write a factual description of a healthy meal to be served at a youth hostel. You are a nutritionist working at a reputed Hospital. Do not use more than 80 words.                                                    5m

OR

You are Geetu Singh, the Incharge of your school “Painting Club”. You have received an invitation from the nearby DAV School to participate in the activities of the Painting Club during the winter break. Write a reply declining the offer giving a valid reason.  (Word limit 50-80)

4. Doaba Book House has brought out a comprehensive book on ‘Effective Creative Writing Skills in English.’ Write a letter to a well known and highly frequented bookshop in the capital offering 25% discount on the above book on the purchase of minimum 150 copies of the book. You are the Administrative Officer, British School, Delhi. 10m

 OR

You are a resident of Saket Pocket C. The sweepers of MCD neither clean the streets nor pick up the garbage regularly. Write a letter of complaint to the Commissioner, MCD, bringing to his notice both the problem and the outcome of such callous attitude. Request him to take necessary steps.(Word limit- 125)

5. Treading a cautious path on the unauthorized places of worship springing up in public places——- including roads——- the Supreme Court ruled that while the existing structures may remain, the government must prevent such encroachment in the future. As the Cultural Club In charge of Pathways School, Hisar, prepare a speech for the morning assembly in about 125-150 words. 10m

OR

Superstitions, they say, are the manifest weakness of the human mind and were created mainly to spread fear. In the wake of the recent Solar Eclipse proved the truth of this when superstition came to dominate the lives of many. Write a speech on the superstitions, myth and irrationality which is prevalent in today’s time.

SECTION C: GRAMMAR

6. The following passage has not been edited and there is one error in each line. Write the incorrect word and the correction in your answer sheet against the correct number:

                                                                                                            ERROR          CORRECTION

Not in the mood to                                                                           eg.    The                        a

(a) wastes time the University reopens early. __________________________________________

(b) The Dyal Nand College, affiliate to The Delhi ________________________________________

(c) University is organize an orientation _____________________________________________

(d) program to the Freshers on Monday. ______________________________________________

(e) The session was being organized _________________________________________________

(f) two day before the new _______________________________________________________

(g) session kicking in. The college _________________________________________________

(h) wants to organize the orientationing session ________________________________________

(i) because they want to start of _____________________________________________________

(j) regular classes in the very first day. ________________________________________________

7. Look at the words and phrases below. Rearrange them to form meaningful sentences. 5m

(a) put into/ as the/ at low/ baby can/ he is/ as soon/ water/ toddle/ tide/

(b) water/ the baby/ in the/ here/ plays/ site and/

(c) long enough/ the mother/ him/ does not/ to weary/ there/ leave him/

(d) older/ at low tide/ as/ wade about/ allowed to/ he is/ he grows/

(d) look out/ water/ keep a/ into deep/ sharp/ does not stray/ so that he/ his elders/

8. Rohit’s father has to go to Dehradun on an official tour by train. Since he is very busy he asked Rohit to get a ticket. As Rohit has never bought a ticket before, his father gives him instructions. Frame 5 sets of meaningful dialogue between Rohit and his father based on the above inputs. 5m

9. You come across your friend Sumit in the busy cloth market of Chandni Chowk, Delhi. You have met him after five years. During these years he has launched a tra
10. vel and tourism company and is running it successfully. You have a number of questions to ask him. Frame ten questions you would like to ask him. 5m

SECTION D — LITERATURE

10. Read the following extract and answer any one of the following:             7m

“I know why the caged bird beats his wings

Till its blood is red on the cruel bars.”

(a) Name the poet.

(b) Explain the line, ‘Till its blood is red on the cruel bars.’                                                             2m

(c) What does the bird symbolize?                                                                                                  1m

(d) Identify the figure of speech in the second line.                                                                         2m

(e) Who does the bird appeal to for help?

OR

Dumb

As old medallions to the thumb,

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone

Of casement ledges where the moss has grown——

A poem should be wordless

                                                As the flight of birds

(a) Name the poet and the poet.                                                                                                     1m

(b) What do ‘dumb’ and ‘thumb signify?                                                                                          2m

(c) What are the two words used in the extract which expresses the meaning of a poem without saying anything?                                                                                                                             1m

(d) Which literary device is used in the poem? Give an example.                                                  2m

(e) What are the qualities of a good poem according to the above lines?                                      1m

11. Answer any two of the following in about 40 – 50 words each: (4×2=8)

(a) In the poem ‘Of Mothers, Among Other Things’, why does the Narrator say, ‘my cold parchment tongue licks bark’?

(b) How should a poem bring out grief and love, according to Archibald MacLeish?

(c) In the lines, ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’, who is the poet describing? Who is its close friend? And why have they been described so?

12. Answer any one of the following in about 80 – 100 words: 5m

Who is the Master of the World

Who shall I condemn to death

(a) Name the play and the author.                                                                                                  1m

(b) Who speaks these words and to whom?                                                                                   1m

(c) Who does ‘Master of the World’ refer to?                                                                                   1m

(d) What is his dilemma?                                                                                                                 1m

(e) Why does he call it ‘his last act of mercy’?                                                                                1m

OR

In the play Alexander has been portrayed as a man of action and at the same time as a man of emotion also. Elucidate.

13. Answer any two of the following in about 40-50 words each: (4×2=8)

1. a) What were the drawbacks in the plan that the two comedians had devised to meet the conditions of the challenge put forth by Suzanne?

(b) Explain: But do not take from any man his song.

(c) Why does the writer conclude that the bee was morally higher in the scale than the mosquito?

(d) In what context does Einstein say: Knowledge is dead; the school, however, serves the living? What does he imply by it?

14. Answer any one of the following in about 100-125 words: 7m

You are one of Lisa’s devoted admirers who have followed her career with great interest. You have witnessed the performance she gives after Doronin’s death. You are so moved that you write a letter to congratulate her on her brilliant performance and to express your sympathy at the news of the major’s death which you have learnt from the other actors. Write the letter within 100 – 125 words.

OR

The story, “A Room 10′ × 8′ ” is one full of ironical instances. Discuss them within 100 – 125 words.