Abiturprüfung 2014

ENGLISCH

– Prüfungsteil Hörverstehen –

Vorname und Name des Prüflings:

__________________________________
Abiturprüfung 2014 2 Hörverstehen

A. Listening comprehension

You will have five minutes to study the tasks below. Then you will hear the recording twice,
with an interval of three minutes to complete the tasks. After the second listening, you will
have four minutes to finalise your answers.
You must not use your dictionaries while the audio text is being presented.
Do not tick more than the number of answers set in a task, or else you will not get any
credits for this task.

60 Second Idea
Bridget Kendall hosts the radio programme “60 Second Idea”. Each week she is joined by
three guests, one of whom is given 60 seconds to present an idea designed to improve the
world. These ideas are not always practicable, but they are often entertaining and insightful.
After the presentation, all of the participants discuss the topic.

1. The guests on the show: Complete the grid with the missing information. ___ / 4

guest job(s)
Emile Bruneau cognitive neuroscientist

Qais Akbar Omar - _________________________________________

- _________________________________________

John York - _________________________________________

- _________________________________________

2. What does Emile Bruneau tell the listeners about his behaviour as a ___ / 1
driver? Tick the correct answer.
 It took him a long time to learn to be polite towards pedestrians.
 He gets annoyed about old ladies who cross the road slowly.
 It often sounds more aggressive than intended when he honks.

3. What two basic types of car horn tones does Emile suggest? ___ / 2

- __________________________________________________________
- __________________________________________________________

4. Gapped summary: What else does he propose? Complete the text. ___ / 2
Drivers who have been caught _______________________________________
should only be allowed to use one horn tone, maybe something like the melody
from “Sex and the City”. When used, it would ___________________________
_______________________________________________.
Abiturprüfung 2014 3 Hörverstehen

5. What other types of horn tones are suggested by Bridget and Emile? Give ___ / 2
one example per person.

Bridget: _____________________________________________
Emile: _____________________________________________

6. Decide whether the following statements are true or false. ___ / 4

true false
In Kabul using one’s horn has no particular meaning.  
In India honking is a sign of aggression.  
John York claims he suffers from nightmares.  
He considers drivers in London to be relatively social.  

7. Fill in the missing words. ___ / 3

John York: “I’m not sure nuance is really going to work in traffic
_______________________________________. So I think we need a bit more
_____________________________________________ in this, personally. I’m
suggesting that if you use your horn incorrectly more than three times in a row,
you should just be ____________________________________ driving.”

8. What does Bridget say about the likelihood of the introduction of the new ___ / 1
technology discussed in the report?

______________________________________________________________

9. Which of the following describes the text’s overall subject best? Tick one ___ / 1
option.
 prohibiting aggressive horn tones
 punishing drivers who use their horn too often
 equipping cars with different horn tones
 feminising drivers’ behaviour

Total:
__ / 20
 Abiturprüfung 2014

ENGLISCH

– Textteil –

Arbeitszeit: 190 Minuten

Der Prüfling hat e i n e Textaufgabe seiner Wahl

nach den Arbeitsanweisungen des beiliegenden Aufgabenteils zu bearbeiten.
 Abiturprüfung 2014 2 Textaufgabe I

Textaufgabe I

The New American Super-Family

Amanda Gentle and millions like her are proving Thomas Wolfe1 wrong.
You can go home again.
Like so many other Americans, Gentle was hit hard as the financial
dominoes fell in 2008. The value of her house dropped while property taxes
5 soared. When she was laid off from her job as director of marketing and sales
for a small publishing company, she could no longer keep up. So, at 35 years
old, Gentle did what numerous other 20- and 30-somethings are doing: She
moved back in with her parents. “It was difficult,” Gentle readily admits. “I had
a successful career, and I went from being on my own, in a good place, to
10 basically starting over.”
Gentle is not alone. Adult children of boomers2 – famously overeducated
and underemployed – have created a moving-back-home tsunami. The driving
force behind this trend is financial pressure, particularly rising housing costs,
health insurance premiums, and college debt. Now, more than one in five
15 young adults lives in multi-generational households.
But it’s not just the young who are coming home to roost. Many elderly
parents of boomers are moving in with their children as well. All told, the
number of multi-gen households grew about 30 percent during the past
decade, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. It reflects a turning back to
20 what used to be, well, normal.
“We had a 50-year experiment of thinking of families as two parents and
two kids,” says John Graham, co-author of Together Again: A Creative Guide
to Successful Multigenerational Living. “What’s happening right now is that the
50-year nuclear family experiment is ending.”
 Abiturprüfung 2014 3 Textaufgabe I

25 Not everyone is moving back home. Some never left. Dan, a 25-year-old
healthcare consultant, lives with his parents on the northeast side of
Philadelphia. While going to college, he stayed at home, and after graduating,
Dan gave independence some thought, then decided to stick around. “When I
move out, I’d like to be able to make a down payment on a decent place, not
30 some hole in the wall,” Dan says. “The best way to save money is to spend
wisely, and right now that means living at home.”
Whatever the circumstances, being an adult in your parents’ home is
different from being a teen there. Before Gentle moved in with her parents this
past January, the family sat down in the living room and discussed
35 expectations, including chores, financial responsibilities, and how long she
would stay. This phase of basically resetting her GPS could have turned into
an ugly high school flashback. Instead, having new structure in her life was
soothing. “After all the stress of being laid off and losing my house, it was very
comforting to be with my family,” Gentle says. “I’m used to being very self-
40 sufficient and independent, but it was nice to take a deep breath for a moment
and get back on my feet.”
Gentle has found a job and plans to move out again soon, but author
Graham sees multi-gen living as the wave of the future. “The boomerang kids’
experience is spring training for the long season of baby boomer retirement,”
45 he says. “They’re learning how to live together. That’s vital, because in the
next 10 years, boomers will start moving in with their children.”
He’s undoubtedly correct, but the trend of elderly parents rejoining their
children has already begun. When Hurricane Irene raked the Eastern
Seaboard this past summer, 79-year-old Lois Bechtel grew uneasy as the
50 winds increased and the rain pounded her Stamford, Connecticut, home.
Instead of weathering the storm alone, she dashed a few steps into the
adjoining house to be with her daughter’s family, safe and secure. “If I lived on

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 Abiturprüfung 2014 4 Textaufgabe I

my own, I’d be by myself in storms or other emergencies,” Bechtel says. “Now

I know that if I get sick, they’re close by. It’s a comfort.” Bechtel lives in an
55 attached apartment that allows her privacy when she wishes. According to a
2010 Coldwell Banker trend survey, home builders are on the multi-gen
bandwagon, increasingly incorporating in-law apartments and adding other
features for extended family members, such as separate entries, multiple
kitchens, and second master bedrooms.
60 So, if we’re all going to share, will we be able to get along? It may
surprise you that not only is the answer an emphatic yes, but the multi-gen
household may yield unexpected benefits, from sharing chores and childcare
to the more abstract but equally vital opportunity to really get to know one’s
cultural history. In fact, according to Graham, the nuclear family concept
65 wasn’t ever that terrific in the first place: “We’re not designed to live that way.
We’re designed to thrive in extended family units,” he says.

From: Doug Donaldson, “The New American Super-Family”, in: The Saturday Evening
Post, July/August 2012, adapted from http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2012/07/05/in-
the-magazine/trends-and-opinions/superfamily.html (abridged)

Annotations:
1 Thomas Wolfe author of the novel You Can’t Go Home Again (1940);
the phrase “you can’t go home again” means that once
you’ve left your old life, you can’t return to it
2 boomers baby boomers, here: people born between 1946 and
1964
 Abiturprüfung 2014 5 Textaufgabe II

Textaufgabe II

Running Late

Dana Halter, the protagonist, is an American woman in her early thirties who at
the age of four suffered an infection which left her profoundly deaf.

She was stressed, stressed out, running late. And when she got to the
four-way stop at the end of the block she felt momentarily blessed because
there was no one there to stop for, yet even as she made a feint of slowing
and shifted from neutral to second with a quick deft plunge of clutch and
5 accelerator, she spotted the patrol car parked just up the street in the bruised
shadow of an SUV.
There was a moment of suspended time, the cop frozen at the wheel of
his car, she giving him a helpless exculpatory1 look, and then she was past
him and cursing herself as she watched him pull a lazy U-turn behind her and
10 activate the flashing lights.
She watched the cop – the patrolman – in her side mirror as he sliced
open the door, hitched up his belt and walked stiffly to her car.
She had her license and registration ready and held them out to him in
offering, in supplication, but he didn’t take them, not yet. He was saying
15 something, lips flapping as if he were chewing a wad of gristle2, but what was
it? It wasn’t License and registration, but what else could it be? Is that the sun
in the sky? What’s the square root of a hundred forty-four? Do you know why I
pulled you over? Yes. That was it. And she did know. She’d run a stop sign3.
Because she was in a hurry – a hurry to get to the dentist’s, of all places – and
20 she was running late.
“I know,” she said, “I know, but... but I did shift down...”

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 Abiturprüfung 2014 6 Textaufgabe II

He was young, this patrolman, no older than she. His eyes were too big
for his head and they bulged out like a Boston terrier’s. There was a softness
to his jaw, that when combined with the eyes – liquid and weepy – gave him
25 an unfinished look, as if he weren’t her age at all but an adolescent, a big-
headed child all dressed up spick-and-span in his uniform and playing at
authority. She saw his face change when she spoke, but she was used to that.
He said something then, and this time she read him correctly, handing
him the laminated license and the thin wafer of the registration slip. He backed
30 away from the car and said something further – probably that he was going to
go back to his own vehicle and run a standard check on her license before
writing out the standard ticket for running the standard stop sign – and this
time she kept her mouth shut.
For the first few minutes she wasn’t aware of the time passing. All she
35 could think was what this was going to cost her, points on her license, the
insurance and that now she was definitely going to be late. And if she was late
for the dentist and the procedure that was to take two hours minimum, as
she’d been advised in writing to assure that there would be no
misunderstanding, then she would be late for her class4 too and no one to
40 cover for her.
But what was taking him so long? She had an urge to look over her
shoulder, fix the glowing sun-blistered windshield with a withering stare, but
she resisted the impulse and lowered her left shoulder to peer instead through
the side mirror.
45 Nothing. There was a form there, the patrolman’s form, a bulked-up
shadow, head bent. She glanced at the clock on the dash5. Ten minutes had
passed since he’d left her. She wondered if he was a slow learner, dyslexic,
the sort of person who would have trouble recollecting the particular statute of
the motor vehicle code6 she stood in violation of.
50 She was thinking of her dentist, when the door of the police car caught
the light as it swung open again and the patrolman emerged.
 Abiturprüfung 2014 7 Textaufgabe II

50 She was thinking of her dentist, when the door of the police car caught
the light as it swung open again and the patrolman emerged.
Right away she could see that something was wrong. His body language
was different, radically different, the stiffness gone out of his legs, his
shoulders hunched forward and his feet stalking the gravel with exaggerated
55 care. She watched till his face loomed up in the mirror – his mouth drawn tight,
his eyes narrowed and deflated – and then turned to face him.
That was when she had her first shock.
He was standing three paces back from the driver’s door and he had his
weapon drawn and pointed at her and he was saying something about her
60 hands – barking, his face discomposed, furious – and he had to repeat
himself, more furious each time, until she understood: Put your hands where I
can see them.
From: T.C. Boyle, Talk Talk, New York 2006 (abridged)

Annotations:
1 exculpatory pretending to be innocent
2 wad of gristle lump of meat that is hard to chew
3 to run a stop sign to fail to stop at a stop sign
4 class Dana teaches at a high school for deaf
students
5 dash short for: dashboard; part of the car in front
of the driver
6 motor vehicle code set of official rules about driving
 Abiturprüfung 2014

ENGLISCH

– Aufgabenteil –

Arbeitszeit: 190 Minuten

Der Prüfling hat e i n e Textaufgabe seiner Wahl zu bearbeiten.

Abiturprüfung 2014 2 Aufgaben zu Text I

Aufgaben zu Text I:

The New American Super-Family

B. Questions on the text 50

Answer the following questions using your own words as far as is

appropriate. Quote correctly.

1. According to John Graham “the 50-year nuclear family (20)

experiment is ending” (ll. 23/24). Examine the new trends
and how each of them is exemplified in the text.

2. Outline what, according to the text, can be done to ensure (10)

that people in a multi-gen household live together
harmoniously and what “unexpected benefits” (l. 62) can
follow.

3. Analyse four stylistic or linguistic devices that make the text (20)
appealing for the reader and that illustrate the point the
writer is trying to make.

C. Composition 40

Choose one of the following topics. Write about 200 to 250 words.

1. Mother’s Day should be abolished. Do you agree?

2. “In every conceivable manner, the family is link to our past, bridge to
our future” (Alex Haley, 1921-1992, American writer).
Comment on this statement.

3. Tension in the family home often plays a central role in books and
films. Choose an example from the English-speaking world and show
how this topic is dealt with.
Abiturprüfung 2014 3 Aufgaben zu Text I

4. You are an exchange student in Kansas and have been asked to write
an article for the school newspaper offering an outsider’s view on
different aspects of American life. You decide to base your article on
the following poster, which you saw at the local community center.

From: http://www.kansasfamily.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Family-Day-logo-11.jpg
(last visited: December 17, 2013)

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Abiturprüfung 2014 4 Aufgaben zu Text I/II

D. Mediation 40

Choose one of the following tasks.

1. Translate the following text into German.

A half-century to the hour after the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered
his clarion call for justice from the Lincoln Memorial, it was the nation’s first
black president who stood on that hallowed marble step, hailing the 50 years
of racial progress that made his election possible but warning Americans that
King’s dream remains unfulfilled.
“The test was not and never has been whether the doors of opportunity
are cracked a bit wider for a few,” President Obama said. “It was whether our
economic system provides a fair shot for the many – for the black custodian
and the white steelworker, the immigrant dishwasher and the Native American
veteran. To win that battle, to answer that call, this remains our great
unfinished business.”
Tens of thousands convened under sometimes rainy skies for a
celebration that was both homage to and echo of the 1963 March on
Washington. “The March on Washington teaches us that we are not trapped
by the mistakes of history, that we are masters of our fate,” Obama said. “We’ll
have to reignite the embers of empathy and fellow feeling, the coalition of
conscience that found expression in this place 50 years ago.”

From: Steve Hendrix/D. Nakamura/A. Halsey III, “March on Washington commemorated by

thousands of celebrants at Lincoln Memorial”, in: http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-08-
28/local/41521397_1_president-obama-peter-yarrow-lincoln-memorial,
August 28, 2013 (abridged; last visited: November 14, 2013)
Die Quellenangabe ist nicht zu übersetzen.
 Abiturprüfung 2014 5 Aufgaben zu Text I/II

2. Bearbeiten Sie die folgende Aufgabe, indem Sie einen zusammenhängen-

den Text von ungefähr 250 Wörtern auf Englisch schreiben und sich der
relevanten Informationen der deutschen Textvorlage bedienen.
Gemeinsam mit einer englischen Schule nehmen Sie an einem internationalen
Projekt zum Thema „The Technology of Tomorrow, Today” teil.
Ihre Aufgabe besteht darin, auf der Grundlage des folgenden Textes einen
englischsprachigen Artikel für den Internetauftritt des Projekts zu verfassen.
Darin beschreiben Sie die Funktionsweise des autonomen Autos und stellen
die möglichen Auswirkungen seiner Nutzung dar.

Computer am Steuer, ungeheuer

[…] Die Geisterhand sitzt oben auf dem Autodach, eingezwängt in eine
Büchse aus Metall. Das Konstrukt sieht seltsam aus – wie eine fahrende
Kaffeemühle. Tatsächlich aber handelt es sich um ein Hightech-System, das
den Straßenverkehr revolutionieren könnte: Die Metallbüchse soll Autos ohne
5 Fahrer ans Ziel bringen, vorbei an Staus und Unfallstellen, sicher, pünktlich,
spritsparend. Wie von Geisterhand geführt. Das „autonome Auto“, wie es in
Fachkreisen genannt wird, klingt nach Science Fiction, doch auf den Straßen
von Nevada ist es schon Realität. Seit ein paar Wochen dürfen die
Bordcomputer dort das Steuer übernehmen, nicht nur auf einer Teststrecke,
10 sondern im normalen Berufsverkehr. Der Führerschein für die Geisterhand ist
ein Novum in der amerikanischen Verkehrsgeschichte. Einzige Bedingung der
Behörden Nevadas ist die Präsenz eines menschlichen Beifahrers, der
einspringen soll, falls die Systeme verrückt spielen. Ein Tritt auf die Bremse
oder die Bewegung des Lenkrads genügen, um den Autopiloten
15 auszuschalten.
Hinter dem Projekt stehen Ingenieure aus dem Hause Google, allen voran der
deutsche Computerwissenschaftler Sebastian Thrun. Als 18-Jähriger verlor
Thrun seinen besten Freund bei einem Autounfall. Er entschloss sich, den
Rest seines Lebens darauf zu verwenden, gegen den tödlichen Alltag auf den

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 Abiturprüfung 2014 6 Aufgaben zu Text I/II

20 Straßen anzukämpfen. Thrun studierte in Hildesheim und Bonn, dann

wanderte er nach Kalifornien aus. Dort lehrt er an der Universität Stanford und
widmet sich als Google-Fellow den Forschungsarbeiten am autonomen Auto.
Acht Prototypen aus den Laboratorien des Technologiekonzerns haben nun in
Nevada eine Zulassung erhalten. Sechs Toyota Prius, ein Audi TT und ein
25 Lexus RX 450h. In allen Fahrzeugen übernehmen Lasersysteme und GPS-
Ortung die Rolle der menschlichen Sinnesorgane. Computerprogramme
verarbeiten die Datenströme und lenken die Google-Mobile durch den
Wüstenstaat. […]
Sogar ein eigenes Kennzeichen für die autonomen Autos gibt es in Nevada
30 schon. Eine liegende Acht, das Symbol für Unendlichkeit, auf einem roten
Hintergrund, dazu der Schriftzug: „Autonomous Vehicle“. Bruce Breslow, der
Chef von Nevadas Zulassungsbehörde, findet das Unendlichkeitssymbol
würde am besten passen zum „Auto der Zukunft“. Aber macht sie wirklich das
Auto der Zukunft aus, die auf dem Dach aufmontierte Geisterhand?
35 Es ist kaum vorstellbar, dass Autokäufer in ein paar Jahren bereit wären, auf
computergesteuerte Autos umzusteigen. Viele Menschen beschleicht ein
ungutes Gefühl, wenn die eigene Möglichkeit zur Kontrolle der versprochenen
Sicherheit eines IT-Systems geopfert wird. Und selbstverständlich verlöre
Autofahren die emotionale Qualität, auf die Konzerne in ihrer aufwendig
40 produzierten Werbung so gerne abheben.
Solche Fragen beschäftigen Thrun nicht. Für ihn geht es vor allem um eines:
die Sicherheit. Im Autoland Amerika sterben jedes Jahr 30 000 Menschen im
Straßenverkehr. Und menschliches Versagen ist mit großem Abstand die
Unfallursache Nummer eins. […] Die Akzeptanzprobleme sind [jedoch]
45 gewaltig. Menschen vertrauen eben lieber ihren eigenen Fähigkeiten; das
Gefühl, sich einem Computersystem auszuliefern, schürt hingegen Angst. […]
Eine vielleicht noch wichtigere Hürde für die Einführung der neuen
Technologie als die psychologischen Vorbehalte gegen Computer ist der
 Abiturprüfung 2014 7 Aufgaben zu Text I/II

Einwand, dass führerlose Fahrzeuge im Straßenverkehr enorme Verwirrung

50 stiften würden. Beispielsweise an Kreuzungen, an denen Menschen ihr
Fahrverhalten oftmals nach Zeichen anderer Fahrer richten.
Sie geben einander Signale, eine Handbewegung, ein Blick in die Augen reicht
zur Verständigung. Menschen wissen, wie sich andere Menschen orientieren.
Was in einem Computer vor sich geht, wissen sie nicht. Dieses Problem ließe
55 sich nur lösen, wenn alle Autos auf Autopilot umstellen würden – was
einstweilen noch vollkommen unrealistisch erscheint. Doch vielleicht werden
die Vorteile autonomer Verkehrsmittel die Skeptiker irgendwann überzeugen,
schließlich gehen sie über den Sicherheitsaspekt hinaus. Computersysteme
im Auto dienen schließlich auch dem Umweltschutz. Die Programme lassen
60 sich so einstellen, dass sie den Spritverbrauch minimieren. Anders als
mancher menschlicher Fahrer haben die Bordcomputer keine Freude an
heulenden Motoren und quietschenden Reifen. Und auch darum geht es: um
verlorene Zeit. Staus sind eine massive Produktivitätsbremse in modernen
Volkswirtschaften. Stunden, die für die Arbeit genutzt werden können,
65 verstreichen mit stumpfsinnigem Warten, wenn mal wieder eine Unfallstelle die
Autobahn blockiert.
[…] Zwar sind die Aussichten gering, dass das autonome Google-Mobil
demnächst in Serienproduktion ginge. Der Computerkonzern kann aber darauf
hoffen, Technologien und Patente an Autohersteller zu verkaufen.

From: Moritz Koch, „Computer am Steuer, ungeheuer“,

in: Süddeutsche Zeitung, 11.06.2012, p. 41 (abridged)

130

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Abiturprüfung 2014 8 Aufgaben zu Text II

Aufgaben zu Text II:

Running Late

B. Questions on the text 50

Answer the following questions using your own words as far as is

appropriate. Quote correctly.

1. Retrace the events of that day and identify the feelings they (20)
trigger in Dana.

2. Examine the strategies Dana has developed to deal with the (10)
difficulties that she encounters as a deaf person.

3. Analyse the narrative perspective. How does it contribute to (20)

the reader’s perception of the patrolman’s character and what
effect is created by it?

C. Composition 40

Choose one of the following topics. Write about 200 to 250 words.

1. “Inclusive education means that all students attend and are

welcomed by their neighbourhood schools in age-appropriate,
regular classes and are supported to learn, contribute and
participate in all aspects of the life of the school”
(http://www.inclusionbc.org).
Outline how you think students with mental or physical
disabilities can be included in everyday school life.

2. “Science may have found a cure for most evils; but it has
found no remedy for the worst of them all – the apathy of
human beings” (Helen Keller, 1880-1968; deaf-blind American
author).
Comment on this statement.

3. What might happen next? Continue telling the story.

Abiturprüfung 2014 9 Aufgaben zu Text II

4. Describe and interpret the following cartoon and comment on

it.

From: http://www.cartoonstock.com

D. Mediation 40

See p. 4 task D.

130