TOEFL iBT - Sample Essay ESL Study Guide

Topic: Many people visit museums when they travel to new places. Why do you think people visit museums? Use specific reasons and examples to support your answer.

Museums are presents the whole world left to us, with which we can learn lots of things we did not previously know, be aware of what has happened in the past as well as what is going to happen in the future, or gain self-understanding. Personally, among countless factors which influence the reason for visiting museums, there are three conspicuous aspects as follows. The main reason for my propensity for visiting museums is that more about local histories can be known in this way. Nowadays, many museums are mainly operating for responsibilities to collect, preserve historic treasures and exhibit fine art and antiquities. For instance, the National Museum of Chinese History, the first of these kinds to be established in China has over 300,000 items, including more than 2,000 first-grade pieces items, 100,000 photographs of cultural relics and over 200,000 professional books. As you walk around the General Chinese History exhibition rooms, looking at the cultural relics and imagining the past, you may feel that you are traveling along a path spanning the course of Chinese history. Another reason can be seen by every person is that you can see something rare so much as unique in museums. For example, Emperor QinShihuang, the first emperor in Chinese history, is known as the Emperor Qin's Terra-cotta Warriors and Horses. Today, the Emperor Qin's Terracotta Museum, "the eighth Wonder of the world", is not only a treasure house where the tourists can learn histories, but also a main scenic spot of China. The vivid pottery figures, colorful uniforms and various weapons, acclaimed as the peak of perfection, are unique forever. Furthermore, visiting museums can enrich our knowledge about various sides, such as preventive measures of a disease, the reason of earthquake, man's region, the latest development of the laser and so on. The inventive genius may be inspired in someone by making exhibits, because knowledge is acquired more easily in this way than being taught in class. Still, people might list other reasons to explain why they always visit museums while traveling to new places, but the three points I have explored in the above discussion, I believe, are most relevant to the issue under discussion. TOEFL iBT - Sample Essay ESL Study Guide

Topic: Some people spend their entire lives in one place. Others move a number of times throughout their lives, looking for a better job, house, community, or even climate. Which do you prefer: staying in one place or moving in search of another place? Use reasons and specific examples to support your opinion.

It seems like the world is becoming smaller and smaller, almost by the minute. When I was a child, I had never met anybody from outside my hometown, much less somebody from another country. However, nowadays I routinely interact with people from all over the world. I might discuss a topic with my classmates from Iran, Korea, Brazil, or Palestine; buy computer parts from the shop run by Chinese; have lunch at a Mexican restaurant; or buy Russian pastries at the caf near my house. In these experiences I can see the product of a world in which borders are falling and people are free to move about as they wish. There is nothing more invigorating for me than being a part of this emerging "global village." I have now lived in three different countries, Argentina, France, and the United States and am convinced that I am a better person for it. In each country I found something different. I remember the warmth of the human interaction of my hometown in Argentina; I enjoyed the great sense of culture and wit in France; in the United States, I am impressed by the feeling of liberty and acceptance. In each country I have learned a different language, experienced a different climate, conversed with people in different ways. I have learned that each place has something special about it and that no place on Earth is a perfect place. We may lose one thing when we leave a country, but we always gain something else in its place. So, the greatest benefit of having met so many people from all over the world has been learning that each person and each culture has a different yet valid way of seeing the world. I cannot say that Argentines have a monopoly on how to view the world; nor can I say that the American system of doing things is best. I can only say that from my experience each system works for each culture and that each one is a valid way of seeing the world. Perhaps this point is the most important one for the coming age of information and technology and falling political and trade barriers. As people from all over the world migrate more freely in search of better lives, they will necessarily have to learn to be tolerant of different worldviews. People who do x will learn to accept people who do y and perhaps even experiment with the new way. By accepting cultures different from our own, we learn more of the broad range of the human experience and we are richer people for seeing beauty and truth in its many forms. TOEFL iBT - Sample Essay ESL Study Guide

Topic: Do you agree or disagree with the following statement? One should never judge a person by external appearances. Use specific reasons and details to support your answer.

Most people are worried about their appearance and how other people see them. While it is true that we can sometimes tell something about people by looking at their external appearance, it is not the best measurement. I believe that people should not judge others by external appearances. This is because it is unfair to make assumptions about a persons character based on outward appearance and because people change their appearance to fit different situations. To begin with, someones external appearance is not a mirror of his or her inner self. I can relate an example from my own life. I came from a very poor family that was unable to put me through university, so throughout my academic career it was required that I work part-time in order to pay for my tuition each semester. During the summer, I was covered in sweat and dirt from working for a lawn care service, but when people saw me in that condition, they assumed I was uneducated and not very intelligent. In reality, I was a straight A student with a good academic

reputation on campus and among my professors. Customers I worked for could not see this, and my co-workers were also surprised to see me reading textbooks during breaks. Judging a book by its cover can often lead to mistaken assumptions. Moreover, external appearances can change with location. For example, think of an evening at the opera where formal clothes are required. In the audience of an opera hall, you can see men in tuxedoes and women in evening gowns. Everyone is dressed the same, so there is no real way to determine what everyone does in their everyday lives. The man sitting next to the doctor may be a gas station attendant, and the women next to the lawyer may be a housewife. In certain settings, looks can be deceiving and there is no telling what is under the wrapper. That is because clothing, hairstyles and other factors of external appearance can be adjusted to fit any situation. A gas station attendant might love opera and a company CEO might like to bowl on the weekends. To make people do it, it is almost never safe to make an assumption about people based only on external appearances. It is not accurate to judge a personal trait based on outward appearance. Furthermore, people can change their appearance to fit occasions where their true selves do not show through. For these reasons, it is important to get to know someone before making a judgment.