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New! Learning to Communicate

A multi-
multi-skill course in English
IO N The Ugly Duckling
EDIT Unit 15
NE W Grammar

Once there was a little brown duck. All summer long she sat on her nest and
waited patiently for her eggs to hatch. She had six eggs, five white and one
brown. The brown egg puzzled her a great deal for it was so different from the
others. However, she took great care to keep it just as warm as the rest.

The days passed and one by one the

white eggs hatched. Only the big brown
egg remained in the nest. The duck was
worried. Suddenly, she heard a small crack.
The egg was hatching at last! Out scrambled
a strange-looking bird covered in dull
brown fluff. He did not look at all like
the mother duck’s other
pretty golden chicks.

Wherever he went, the poor ugly duckling

was laughed at and teased until one day he
decided he could bear it no longer. He would
have to run away!

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New! Learning to Communicate
A multi-
multi-skill course in English
IO N The Ugly Duckling
EDIT Unit 15
NE W Grammar

One night, he crept out of the farmyard and ran quite a long way. There he lay
down and rested by night. The next day, he began to wander around. After a
time, he came to a small, tumbledown cottage. He crept through a crack in the
door into a warm little room. An old woman lived in the cottage with her cat and
her hen, and when they discovered the little duckling next morning, they were
most surprised.

‘What sort of a creature are you?’ asked the hen haughtily. ‘Can you lay eggs?’
The duckling shook his head.

‘Can you ruffle your fur when you are angry, or purr when you are pleased?’
asked the snooty cat. Again the duckling shook his head in shame.

‘What a useless animal you are,’ declared the hen. ‘You can neither lay eggs nor
purr. You can’t stay here.’

But the old lady smiled kindly. ‘Let him stay for a little while. He may learn to do
something useful in time.’ And so the duckling lived in the cottage with the old
lady, the cat, and the hen, and the weeks passed happily.

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© copyright Oxford University Press

 1
New! Learning to Communicate
A multi-
multi-skill course in English
IO N The Ugly Duckling
EDIT Unit 15
NE W Grammar

A. Answer the following questions in your exercise book:

1. Why did the brown egg puzzle the little brown duck?

2. Describe the bird that came out of the brown egg.

3. Why did the little duckling decide to run away?

4. Who lived in the little cottage?

5. What did the hen and the cat ask the duckling?

6. Why did the hen say that the duckling could not stay there? What did
the old lady say?

B. Put a tick mark (ü) against the correct meaning of each of the words taken
from the story:

1. patiently (a) calmly, without any complaint or protest

(b) a person who needs to be attended to by a
doctor
(c) a place in front of a house

2. puzzled (a) a soft sticky substance

(b) a big nest
(c) not able to understand something

3. ugly (a) mother duckling

(b) unpleasant to look at
(c) very beautiful

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© copyright Oxford University Press

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New! Learning to Communicate
A multi-
multi-skill course in English
IO N The Ugly Duckling
EDIT Unit 15
NE W Grammar

4. tease (a) to laugh at somebody and make jokes about

him/her
(b) to cry for a long time
(c) coffee, cake and sandwiches

5. tumbledown (a) a glass with a flat bottom

(b) a plant that grows like a bush
(c) old and in a poor condition, almost falling
down

6. cottage (a) soft white cheese

(b) a small house, especially in the country
(c) a small hospital

7. snooty (a) treating people as if they are not as good or as

important as you are
(b) a person with a long nose
(c) a hen that cannot lay eggs

C. Pick out three adjectives from the story and write them here:

................................ ................................ ................................

D. Pick out three adverbs from the story and write them here:

................................ ................................ ................................

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© copyright Oxford University Press

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New! Learning to Communicate
A multi-
multi-skill course in English
IO N The Ugly Duckling
EDIT Unit 15
NE W Grammar

E. Pick out the prepositions from these sentences:

1. All summer long she sat on her nest. ...............................

2. The big brown egg remained in the nest. ................................

3. He crept through the door into a warm little room. ......................

......................................................................................................

F. Rewrite the following sentences changing the tenses of the verbs as di-
rected:

1. The days passed quickly. (Change to past continuous.)

......................................................................................................

2. The duckling shook his head. (Change to simple future.)

......................................................................................................

G. Name the genders of the following nouns:

1. egg .............................. 4. lady ..............................

2. hen .............................. 5. cottage ..............................

3. cat .............................. 6. chicks ..............................

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