A2 Flyers Reading Part 4 Exercise 3 | Pre-intermediate level

This is A2 Flyers Reading Part 4 Exercise 2 practice for the Cambridge Assessment English A2 Flyers (YLE) exam. Students should be able to read and understand a factual text about chickens.

There is a text with some missing words (gaps). Next to the line where each word is missing, there is a choice of three possible answers. You have to decide which answer is correct and copy the word into the gap.

Hippos

Read the text about hippos. Choose the right words in the gaps.

This kind of animal has an interesting name. We call it a hippo, but its long name is ‘hippopotamus’. Hippopotamus (1) ‘river horse’. It has that name because hippos spend lots (2) time in the water and their ears look like horses’ ears.

Hippos like (3) grass too. But hippos are much bigger (4) horses. The only animal in the world that (5) a bigger mouth is a whale! A hippo is sometimes a dangerous animal but it is not always brave. It will often run to the water (6) hide. When it’s swimming, its nose, eyes and ears are above the water (7) it can still smell, see and hear. When a hippo decides to go under the water, it closes its nose and walks on the bottom of the river (8) it can find plants to eat.

It’s easy for a hippo to stay under the water (9) eight minutes! Hippos (10) not eat meat. Their favourite food is river plants and different kinds of grass, and they usually only eat at night.