🎬 Unit: Movies, TV & Streaming • Lesson 3/6

How Pictures Learned to Move 📽️

🎟️ ADMIT ONE: Lesson Guide & Instructions B1 Reading Skills

👩‍🏫 Teacher Tips

1. Remind learners that True/False/Not Given tests explicit text statements, not personal knowledge.
2. Guide students to underline timestamps, names, and paragraph markers before reading questions.

🎯 Student Steps

1. Skim paragraphs A–D to understand the main chronological timeline and key scientific concepts.
2. Answer questions 1–8 strictly using stated facts—do not assume extra historical information.

📜

Reading Passage: How Pictures Learned to Move

~240 words

Paragraph A

On 28 December 1895, the brothers Auguste and Louis Lumière showed short films to paying visitors in the basement of the Grand Café in Paris. People paid one franc. The programme had ten films, each less than a minute long. One of them was called "Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory". Many people call this the birth of cinema.

Paragraph B

In 1912, the German psychologist Max Wertheimer described the phi phenomenon. When two still lights are shown one after the other, we see movement between them.

Paragraph C

Films are a good example. A film is a fast series of still pictures. Our brain joins the pictures and we see movement.

Paragraph D

Silent films were shown at roughly 16 to 24 pictures (frames) per second. Between 1927 and 1930, 24 frames per second became the standard for sound films.

EXERCISE 1: IELTS True / False / Not Given

Do the following statements agree with the information given in the reading passage? Select TRUE, FALSE, or NOT GIVEN.

1 Every visitor paid more than one franc to enter the Grand Café screening in December 1895.

____ TRUE ____ FALSE ____ NOT GIVEN

2 The people who watched the factory clip in Paris felt frightened by the moving images.

____ TRUE ____ FALSE ____ NOT GIVEN

EXERCISE 2: Matching Information

Which paragraph contains the following information? Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

3 A description of an effect in which still lights can trick what we see.

____ Paragraph A ____ Paragraph B ____ Paragraph C ____ Paragraph D

4 A reference to a frame rate that became the standard for films with sound.

____ Paragraph A ____ Paragraph B ____ Paragraph C ____ Paragraph D

EXERCISE 3: Multiple Choice Questions

Choose the correct letter, A, B, C, or D.

5 According to Paragraph C, how does a viewer experience continuous motion while watching a film?

____ A. The camera changes the speed of projection automatically. ____ B. The recorded sounds distract the eyes from noticing gaps between scenes. ____ C. The brain joins the separate pictures, so viewers see movement. ____ D. Special lighting in the theatre creates an illusion of traveling objects.

6 Why is the December 1895 gathering regarded as "the birth of cinema"?

____ A. It was the first time that recorded sound was synchronized with film. ____ B. It was a public event where people paid to watch several short films. ____ C. It proved the psychological principle known as the phi phenomenon. ____ D. It established 24 frames per second as the global cinema standard.

EXERCISE 4: Sentence Completion

Complete the sentences below. Choose NO MORE THAN TWO WORDS from the passage for each answer.

7 The optical illusion described by Max Wertheimer in 1912 was called the

____ (Type 1-2 words...) .

8 Between 1927 and 1930, 24 frames per second became the standard for

____ (Type 1-2 words...) .

Reading: How Moving Pictures Work

How Pictures Learned to Move 📽️

Reading Passage: How Pictures Learned to Move

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