Questões de Vestibular de Inglês

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    When I got to the airport, I learnt that the plane from Cairo, on which my brother was travelling, had been delayed at Paris with engine trouble and was expected to be about an hour late. As a rule I can pass the time quite happily; watching the planes land and take off, but that evening I had a headache; which I thought that the noise of the engines might make worse. I decided, therefore to walk around to make the time pass quickly.

    First of all I went back to the place where I had left my car to make sure that all the doors were locked. The walk in the fresh air did me good, for I felt slightly better as I entered the main airport building again. I made my way to the restaurant, where I ordered a cup of black coffee. As I stood drinking this at the counter, I studied the faces of the people around me. Some passengers were obviously anxious about the time, and kept looking at their watches; others checked to see that they had tickets, passports and money. Where there was a group of people, it was easy to tell which one was about to leave. He was the object of everyone’s attention and looked either very happy or very sad at the thought of departure.

    There was one woman who burst into tears as she said goodbye to the relatives or friends who had come to see her off. When I had finished my coffee, I went along to the bookstall, where I bought a couple of magazines, both of them about travel, which would help to make the time pass pleasantly. Then I went into one of the waiting-rooms and made myself comfortable in a big armchair. I had hardly had time to open one of my magazines, when someone came up and put his hand on my shoulder. It was an old friend; who was just about to leave on a business trip to South America. Since we had not seen each other for a long time, we found plenty to talk about until the arrival of my brother’s plane from Paris was announced.

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In the past year, 3-D printing has been experiencing major breakthroughs, and it promises even greater strides in the fields of sustainability, technology and medical research. Yet the technology is currently being pioneered for another purpose: to help visually impaired children understand the fantastical worlds depicted in classic literary works such as Goodnight Moon and Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?

A project at the University of Colorado is hoping to jump-start the commercial development of tactile books, allowing children to follow along text read aloud by tracing the corresponding raised illustrations with their fingers. The technology converts the images in original titles into pictures you can feel with a 3-D printer. Researchers at the Tactile Picture Book Project are working in conjunction with Denver’s Anchor Center—a nonprofit specializing in helping visually impaired children achieve educational success—on the project.

Tactile books are crucial to early cognitive development for blind children, who typically don’t begin to read Braille until the age of 6. The Anchor Center’s executive director, Alice Applebaum, explained in an interview with Mashable that the project can help even younger children develop the ability to explore the world through their hands. "It is one more opportunity for visually impaired children to experience literacy in an expanded way," she said. "Will it make them better readers? Not necessarily, but it will make them more aware of what the world looks like.

Tactile books are currently pricey to produce, but affordable 3-D printing is projected to be available within the next two to three years.

Researchers aim to eventually have the option available for both parents and educators, allowing them to take photos and send them to a 3-D printer for their personalized tactile book. The Tactile Picture Book Project is also testing workshops and software programs that might make it possible for parents to create tactile books for their own children.Mashable reports that, since the original Goodnight Moon book was printed, titles including The Very Hungry Caterpillar and The Cat in the Hat have been added to the steadily growing collection, which means the infamous Everyone Poops can’t be far behind on the list.