Evo-English

C1 ADVANCED · READING · LESSON 8

Repairing What We Throw Away

Read about repair projects that change how people understand and use their possessions. Practise following references and lexical chains so that each paragraph connects to the next.

1. Find the referent, not just the nearest noun

A referent is the person, object, event or idea that an expression points to. It, they, these, that, such a decision and the same approach can carry information across a paragraph boundary.

“The organiser postponed the exhibition because the roof was leaking. That decision disappointed the artists.”

That decision refers to postponing the exhibition, not to the roof or the leak. A reference can summarise a whole action or proposition. Check the meaning of the sentence, rather than automatically choosing the closest noun.

2. Keep the order of a contrast

The former refers to the first of two things just mentioned; the latter refers to the second. A paragraph that introduces the right pair in the wrong order can still break the link.

“The archive accepted photographs and physical samples. The former could be sent online; the latter had to be delivered.”

Here the former means photographs and the latter means physical samples. Matching only the general topic of submissions would miss the ordering requirement.

3. Follow a lexical chain

Writers avoid repeating the same noun by using synonyms, broader labels, descriptions and words naming parts or outcomes. A lexical chain lets you follow the same subject through those changes.

“A resident donated an old armchair. The piece of furniture needed a new covering, but its frame was intact.”

The piece of furniture renames the armchair; its frame identifies a part. The frame is related to the chair but is not another name for the whole chair.

Distinguish same entity from related entity: a tool and the task it enables belong to the same topic but cannot automatically replace each other as referents. Likewise, a plan, an action and its result describe different stages.

4. Check identity and meaning together

Underline the reference expression and ask what kind of referent it needs: person, object, group, action or claim.
Locate a possible antecedent in the preceding text. Number and grammar can help, but more than one candidate may fit grammatically.
Substitute the full meaning: read “that decision” as the actual decision, or “these items” as the particular items.
Check whether the sentence makes the right claim about that referent. Two columns, for example, are not interchangeable if they record different information.

Do not accept a paragraph merely because it supplies a plural noun for they. The people or objects must also have the role the continuation assigns to them.

5. Use references at both edges of a gap

A missing paragraph may begin by taking up a problem from the paragraph before it and end by introducing something the next paragraph assumes. Track both edges:

Before → candidate: Does the candidate respond to the people, objects or problem already introduced?
Candidate → after: Does it introduce the precise referent needed by the next paragraph, with the right meaning?

A shared word such as record is a clue, not a guarantee. A stock record and a visitor’s account may both be records, but they preserve different information. A good match maintains the identity, purpose and development of the idea.

6. Apply this to Part 7

Part 7 uses six gaps representing missing paragraphs and seven candidate paragraphs, one of which is extra. Read the whole retained text first. Identify references at gap boundaries, compare candidates and then reread each completed sequence. Use each candidate at most once.

A wrong candidate can contain the correct-looking noun yet assign it a different meaning. Check positive fits before treating a paragraph as the extra one. Structure and development still matter alongside the reference links.

Cambridge English Part 7 format reference. The texts here describe original fictional community projects and do not require specialist repair knowledge.

Your practice route

Exercises 1: follow pronouns, summary expressions and renamed ideas in a complete article (8 questions). Exercises 2: connect six short extracts by choosing their missing paragraph (6 questions). Exercises 3: restore six paragraphs in one Part 7-style text (6 questions).

Complete a whole block before selecting Check answers. Feedback includes exact quotations, explanations of the reference links and reasons every alternative fails. Try again resets only its block and shuffles the answer cards. In Exercises 3, letters identify fixed paragraphs, not positions in a list.

Exercises:

C1 ADVANCED · READING · EXERCISES 1

Repairing What We Throw Away

Follow the reference

Read the complete article and follow its pronouns, summary expressions and lexical links. Choose one answer per question. Complete all 8 questions before selecting Check answers.

You can refer to the text throughout. Click any part of an answer card.

More than a repair counter

A fictional community project.

Paragraph P1At the first Saturday repair session, visitors handed over their objects and waited near the door. Volunteers worked behind tables where the tools could be kept together. The organisers thought they had created an efficient free service: a damaged object arrived, someone examined it, and its owner collected it later. The arrangement looked familiar to anyone who had used a commercial repair counter, even though no money changed hands.

Paragraph P2The arrangement kept the work area clear, but it also kept visitors away from the reasoning. When a radio was returned, its owner knew whether it worked but not why it had stopped. A service intended to challenge replacement was still leaving people dependent on someone else to interpret their possessions. The organisers began asking what access meant if a person could enter the room but not join the investigation.

Paragraph P3At the next session, visitors were invited to sit beside a volunteer and describe the fault. Nobody was required to demonstrate technical competence, and an owner could stop taking part without losing the offer of help. That assurance mattered to people who feared being judged for what they did not know. Participation was being offered as an opportunity, rather than made the price of receiving a repair.

Paragraph P4The joint investigation often began with a history: when had the object last worked, and what had changed? Volunteers called this stage diagnosis. Naming the cause, though, was not equivalent to putting it right. A worn component might be identified even when no replacement was available. The team therefore separated understanding a problem from completing a repair, instead of treating both as a single verdict of success or failure.

Paragraph P5A notebook made that separation visible. Each entry recorded the checks attempted and, in a different space, what had eventually happened to the object. These records included unfinished cases as well as completed repairs. Reading them together revealed recurring shortages of particular components. A simple total of objects fixed would have hidden those shortages and made the unfinished work disappear from the account of the service.

Paragraph P6Follow-up conversations suggested another difference. Some visitors whose objects remained unfixed could explain the problem and decide what to do next; others whose objects had been repaired still felt unable to make such a decision. The former had gained something that the repair total missed. This did not make a functioning object unimportant. It showed that the condition of an object and the owner's understanding were related outcomes, rather than interchangeable ones.

Paragraph P7Every visitor could take home a short summary of the checks, their outcome and any unresolved question. It was an account of a decision, not a certificate that the item was sound. The sheet helped owners distinguish a confirmed finding from a suggestion that still needed assessment. It also gave them something specific to discuss if they later sought another opinion, instead of having to reconstruct a conversation from memory.

Paragraph P8The organisers retained their count of completed repairs but added a question about what visitors could now explain or decide. This change made learning visible alongside the practical outcome. The revised approach did not promise that every object should be saved. It gave people better grounds for deciding whether to repair, seek further help or replace something. Keeping an object in use and making its owner less dependent could support each other without being the same achievement.

C1 ADVANCED · READING · EXERCISES 2

Repairing What We Throw Away

Connect the paragraphs

For each of the six short extracts, choose the paragraph that fits between the text before and after the gap. The extracts are independent. Complete all 6 questions before selecting Check answers.

You can refer to the text throughout. Click any part of an answer card.

C1 ADVANCED · READING · EXERCISES 3

Repairing What We Throw Away

Part 7-style practice

Six paragraphs have been removed from the article. Choose from paragraphs A–G the one which fits each gap (1–6). There is one extra paragraph which you do not need to use. Use each paragraph at most once. Complete all 6 questions before selecting Check answers. Suggested practice time: 15 minutes.

You can refer to the text throughout. Click any part of an answer card.

Why people came back

A fictional community project.

Retained paragraph R1A neighbourhood centre opened a monthly repair table to keep useful objects in circulation. Owners waited while volunteers inspected their objects. When four visitors returned after the first session, the coordinator worried about poor work. The return book listed names and objects, but gave no explanation of what each person wanted on the second visit.

Gap 1 · Choose a paragraph in question 1 below.

Retained paragraph R2Those questions did not all describe renewed faults. The query about the unavailable component required a next-step plan, not another inspection. The coordinator wanted a record preserving both the object's condition and its owner's intended action. It should help later volunteers continue a conversation instead of beginning it again.

Gap 2 · Choose a paragraph in question 2 below.

Retained paragraph R3The second column became particularly useful when an item could not be fixed that day. A volunteer could record that the owner intended to find a missing component or seek another assessment. Later staff could ask about that step. Yet discussing these plans at the main bench lengthened the queue. Returning owners with brief questions and newcomers needing a full inspection were waiting in the same line.

Gap 3 · Choose a paragraph in question 3 below.

Retained paragraph R4This division gave both groups a clearer route without treating a follow-up as a failed repair. The question desk revealed obstacles that an explanation did not remove. One visitor understood how to tighten a fitting but lacked a tool she could not justify buying for one use. The organisers had made knowledge available; equipment remained a separate obstacle.

Gap 4 · Choose a paragraph in question 4 below.

Retained paragraph R5The borrowed equipment gave some residents a practical way to use what they had learned. On return, however, several sets arrived with their feedback sheets blank. A volunteer took that silence to mean the tools were useless. One borrower challenged the inference: she had completed the task but found it difficult to describe the process in a written account. The form was filtering the experience.

Gap 5 · Choose a paragraph in question 5 below.

Retained paragraph R6Those alternatives brought previously missing comments into the record. They showed where instructions helped and where a demonstration was still needed. The centre could now describe more than repair and loan totals. A committee member worried that counting visitors twice would make weak repairs appear productive. The report needed to distinguish why people came back before presenting repeated attendance as progress.

Gap 6 · Choose a paragraph in question 6 below.

Retained paragraph R7Such a distinction left the service open to criticism without making every return a failure. The first category preserved cases in which faults recurred; the second documented clarifying follow-ups that helped owners act. Repair initiatives could question automatic replacement by informing decisions. Some objects would still be replaced, but need not be discarded simply because an unexplained problem defeated their owners.

Paragraphs A–G

Paragraph A

The response was a small lending collection assembled from donated hand tools. Residents could borrow a set suited to the task discussed at the session, rather than purchase equipment for one job. Each set travelled with a brief guide and a sheet inviting comments about its use. The centre asked borrowers to bring those comments back when they returned the set.

Paragraph B

They redesigned the visit log with two columns. The first described the condition of the object when it left; the second recorded the owner's next intended action, whether or not a repair had been completed. That plan belonged to the person taking the object home. It would allow a later conversation to start from a decision already discussed, rather than an unexplained entry saying 'unfinished'.

Paragraph C

They redesigned the visit log with two columns. The first described the object and the second listed the cost of the replacement parts used. When no repair was completed, the financial space was left empty. This gave the committee a clearer record of spending per successful repair and made it easier to compare the workshop's costs with those of buying replacement objects.

Paragraph D

Instead of requiring a written description, staff offered a short conversation, a labelled sketch or a note dictated to a volunteer. Each could communicate what had happened without demanding the same writing skills. The choice belonged to the borrower. The aim was to recover an account of the experience, not to turn returning a tool into a test of someone's ability to complete a form.

Paragraph E

Speaking to them changed her interpretation. One wanted to understand a note about an unavailable component; another asked which check had supported the volunteer's conclusion. The others wanted to clarify what to watch for after taking their objects home. They had come back to complete the explanation, not necessarily because the original problem had reappeared. The register alone had concealed that difference.

Paragraph F

The coordinator separated returns prompted by a recurring malfunction from those prompted by a request for clarification. The first category could reveal shortcomings in a repair; the second could show an owner trying to use or understand the advice. Neither category was automatically proof of success. Reporting them separately allowed the centre to discuss both problems with its work and benefits that a repair count could overlook.

Paragraph G

They created a follow-up desk alongside the inspection bench. One volunteer dealt with short questions and earlier plans there, while others inspected newly brought objects at the bench. People were directed according to what they needed from that visit, rather than whether they had attended before. A returning owner with a new fault could still join the inspection queue.