WAEC English Language 2016 Theory Past Questions

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Toun Kan Memorial College, 18, Clifford Crescent, Okoda, Benin City, Edo State. 28th March, 2017. Dear Chisomnazu, You had promised, on our last Instagram chat, to surprise me with a gift when next we contact, and I thought I would get some sumptuous parcel alongside this letter. Guy, this is another breach; another promised-but-failed. I'm sure you haven't forgotten I'm good at pestering people, just the way I paid your family a week visit the last Christmas. Chisom, the contents of your letter read that you are considering studying at Toun Kan College, and thus, enquire about the school as well as seek advice needful for your decision. I therefore write in response to your request. You need to know that Toun Kan is a citadel for both boarders and day students. While the boarders are adequately catered for, the school management runs a transport system that brings in majority of day students — save for those whose parents prefer driving them down on or before 8.00am when the assembly kicks off. At the inception of every term, the parents/guardians whose children/wards come in the school buses pay more than those that bring their children themselves. Since you are enrolling into the senior class, it will be useful to know that the senior boarders pay about two hundred and eighty thousand naira, the senior day-students subscribing to the school transport system pay about two hundred and twenty thousand naira and those without subscription pay about two hundred thousand naira. Toun Kan is also a sex-missed school. However, being a college that is religion-rooted, the school authorities are strict on moral conducts, behaviour and attitude to both learning and teaching. Any student or teacher found wanting in this regard is severely dealt with. Chisom, it may also interest you to know that the School also engages her students in sports activities as well as music training. In fact, she has a sports uniform for both teachers and students, and like other schools in Benin, this is worn every Friday. Every student belongs to one sports house or the other, wherein they train every Friday. However, the music training involves only the boarders and it holds on Saturday morning. While these pieces of information are invaluable in making your decision, I would thus advise that you come in as a boarder. Not minding the seemingly high tuition charges, you stand to gain lots of advantage. I am a boarder and could practically say that home distractions that usually affect day-students' performance are prevented, as boarders have full concentration on their studies. Please let me know what you make of these advice and your final decision. My warm regards to Mum and Dad, and to Ify, your younger sister. See you soon. Your bossom friend, Tobechi.

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THE NEED TO REVIVE THE CORE VALUES OF OUR SOCIETY Today, we live in a society whose core values and etiquette of virtuous living are now under serious threat of erosion. This is due to the enormous negative impact modernisation has on our society, notwithstanding the goodies it has brought to our world. A cursory look at what currently trends in our society reveals how the heavy wind of modernisation is rapidly sweeping sanity and order away. In terms of fashion, the mode of dressing in the 60°S and 70°S popularised fashion to be about what you put on, and the bigger your clothes were, the more fashionable you would appear; people wore shirts and trousers of big sizes covering their body and living virtually nothing to the open. But today, fashion is about what you don't wear, and in this generation, the less body part you cover, the more fashionable people applaud you to be. Our society is going insane as youth now expose what they should cover and cover what they should expose. Children, given the uncurtail access to the internet, now watch foreign movies that strike blows on moral dressing and behaviour. With the adaptation to foreign cultures, sexual immorality is no more prided the way it was in the pre-modern society. Youth no longer see sense in chastity let alone priding it. People are becoming promiscuous and randy, and civilisation is posing more danger to life. The rate of abortion amidst ladies increases by the day. The rate at which internet scamming is increasing is highly disturbing. This shows that hard work and honesty are not only subconsciously discouraged but also replaced with vices — manipulation, corruption, fraud, dishonesty, etc. People now seek every way possible to get rich, de-emphasising the means to getting wealthy and emphasising the end. Therefore, an urgent attention need to be paid to revive these values. Our curriculum at all level of education should place emphasis on moral and cultural values. Our education and other government policies must frown at anything contrary to this. Children/youth must be taught the dignity in honesty and hard work. The society at large must take pride in our customs and parents need to train and encourage their children to imbibe them. Also, it is imperative for government to place strict censor on foreign movies and musical videos encouraging immorality in the society. There should be zero tolerance for such materials. In addition, the civil society organisations, non-government agencies, faith-based organisations, media outfits and other stake holders could also contribute by using various means including social media, to promote society's core values and discourage misdemeanour among youth and young adult. Finally, most of the government economic policies, law and jurisprudence should be strong enough to raise eye brows against fraudulent acts, scamming and internet robbery, as well as sternly punish such criminal acts without any fear or favour.

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La Lakum Grammar School, Off Jeba Road, Lokoja, Kogi State. 1st April, 2017. The Chairman, Parent-Teacher Association, La Lakum Grammar School, Off Jeba Road, Lokoja, Kogi State. Dear Sir, A CONTRARY VIEW ON SINGLE-SEX SCHOOL Recall the decision made by the Association in their (recent) meeting, dated 15th March 2017, to transform the school into a single-sex school. Against this decision, I deem it appropriate as the Senior Prefect, to write this letter, providing cogent reasons why I am convinced that making La Lakum single-sex is not a good decision. One thing La Lakum students have always enjoyed is that the mixed arrangement affords them the privilege to socially cohere, improve on their human relations — particularly among opposite sex, and most importantly have respect for one another. It is not farfetched that children trained in a single sex schools tend to face lots of sex-related and adolescent challenges because they are uninformed, inexperienced and unexposed to manners and behaviour of the opposite sex. They are bereft of how to treat and be treated by the opposite sex. The opportunity the mixed arrangement provides for both sexes to relate, socialise and learn the behavioural pattern of the opposite sex eludes single-sex school students. This has made some female students fall into the trap of randy men who played on their naivety and ignorance. It may also interest you to know that, these days, lesbianism and gayism make strides among students from single-sex school. We have heard and seen evidence of homosexual practices amongst her students from two schools here — in Lokoja. I do not think La Lakum has ever recorded such an instance of homosexual practices amongst her students yet. And I do not think the school management is ready to bear such heinous phenomena or any other sexual perversion(s) that will besmirch its image. Besides, it is quite thoughtful that transforming a mixed school into a single-sex will reduce the tendency to monitor and keep an eye on these adolescents. In a mixed school, it is believed that all — teachers, parents, schools, school management, etc. — are watch dogs to one another in the business of nurturing the students. Once the school becomes single-sex, it will only take in same-sex students and teachers, laying off others. This will further create laxity in monitoring the students. A recent instance of a sexual practice between a female teacher and a male student in a school in the US justifies this. The teacher was monitored and caught by the boy's parent who had earlier observed something fishy. Had the school in question been a single-sex one, the parent would not have probably known because he (the parent) would never have quickly thought gayism was on the prowl between the teacher and his son. Lastly, learning wise, I think that a mixed school provides a balanced and level-playing ground for both sexes. It provides a room for healthy competition among both male and female students, and spurs any of the genders to rise to the challenge whenever the other is taking the lead — in debates, sports, school activities, examinations, class projects, etc. This privilege also eludes students from single-sex schools. These few but cogent reasons, I think, will suffice to make the association have a rethink on embarking on its earlier decision to transform La Lakum Grammar School into a single-sex school. It should have a rethink in the interest of all. Thank you very much. Yours faithfully, Abdul Yinusa, The Senior Prefect.

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A DEBATE TO SUPPORT EDUCATION AS THE BEST LEGACY Good day, Mr. Chairman, Panel of Judges, Accurate Time-Keeper, co-debaters, and my esteemed audience. My name is Anele Julius, and I write in support of the motion which states that education is the best legacy a parent can give a child. The term 'Education' implies a training or process of learning a lesson, skill, trade or profession by teaching, instruction or supervision. This is, however, formal. Education can also take informal through adapting to our environment and developing mentally, morally, socially, aesthetically and behaviourally. Education is what everyone needs and should have, particularly, children who at their age are naive and inexperienced. They need education to discover their potentials, enhance the quality of their life and living condition. A well-trained and educated child is an asset, not a liability. Education is empowerment because it breeds people who are useful and productive not just to themselves and their families but also to the entire society. The illiterate have nothing to offer. They are liabilities; they are solely dependent and they slow down the pace of societal progress. Mr. Chairman, you will also agree with me that the importance placed on education — particularly at primary and secondary levels — in most of the advanced countries reflects their national budgets on the education sector. It is the education sector that researches and develops what the society at large lives on. Today, their commitment pays off. The same, unfortunately, cannot be said of Nigeria. This is because we lack the sustained efforts to invest into our country's education sector. Audience, children are future leaders and education remains a sole platform for raising them. Parents must understand that the leadership problem we in Nigeria is partly traceable to lack of proper education, good moral and acceptable social behaviour, etc. all of which actually at first, began at home with the first teachers — parents. Now, my opponent might want to question the importance of education in the face of the challenges our country faces being unable to provide employment to legions of educated youth out there. I stand to be corrected that it is lack of proper education that has dragged us into the quagmire of unemployment in the first place. We run a system of education that teaches students to get educated so as to seek good jobs, rather than to get education/empowerment that can lead them to self-employment and becoming employers of labour. And now we are reaping the consequence of a faulty education system. In conclusion, as the saying goes 'If education is expensive, try ignorance', the consequence of not properly being educated is highly gruesome when compared to the resources we would have used to educate our children. It is the knowledge which education brings that set us free from perpetual slavery of ignorance. Thank you for your audience.

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A STORY ON HOW PRIDE GOES BEFORE A FALL She carried her shoulders high as she walked past the man and went straight into her class. That wasn't the first time she would be walking out on teachers whenever she was corrected. Neither was it the second time. She wasn't going to let herself be intimidated by anybody. She entered her class, smiling in triumph as her classmates, who had apparently been watching the scenario the whole time, shouted in excitement, 'Another crushing!'. 'Shade, the big girl', someone hailed from the back of the class. She smiled in return and resumed at her space at the back of the class. That was her favourite spot. Only big girls like her would prefer sitting there. Shade was the 'biggest' girl in school and would not hesitate proving that to anybody. She would not take any nonsense from any teacher, and would readily punish any junior student who crossed her path. Every student feared her, including her classmates, who would do anything to win her favour. If being proud would assume any degree, she was an emblem of it. She was a storyteller too, crooking stories that accentuate her pride. She told anyone who cared to listen how her father worked in an oil company and owned fifty gas stations across the country. 'My father is so rich that the government often called to make business dealings with him,' she told Lola, her friend, one siesta afternoon. Everybody who listened to her story seldom doubted it. They were all boarders, and hardly would anyone attempt to investigate the veracity of her claim. Only Lola once questioned her. 'Really? But why does he not allow his driver to drive you down every resumption? I noticed you come down to school through public transport struggling with your loads all alone'. 'Well, my dad once said I would know the value of wealth and know how to manage it when I've experienced what suffering feels like,' she replied. Now, it was time for their third term examinations, and Shade had spent her time playing and gisting with the so-called 'big boys' in the hostel, instead of taking much time out to read. The next day was Maths, and she had not prepared well. She decided to write the formulae of some Maths equation on her laps before entering the exam hall. As the exam was going on, she started copying the equations from her thighs. All the while, she was oblivious a teacher was paying attention to her. It was Mr. Balla, the teacher she walked out on some couple of days earlier. 'Shade! Stand up!!' he exclaimed. Shade knew she was now in trouble. She was caught red handed. She was suspended indefinitely from Divine Touch College and was publicly disgraced on the assembly. Her parents were notified. The shock that rocked the students the next day when her parents arrived was profound. The dad pleaded with the school management to reinstate his daughter. He was just a driver to a wealthy man, whom out of his (the rich man's) magnanimity decided to sponsor his driver's daughter. What would the rich man say if he heard that his driver's daughter had been unserious in her studies, wasting all financial efforts put on her education? Her mum was a mere petty trader. Obviously, Shade was from an indigent family. She felt as if the ground should open up and swallow her. She really learnt it in a hard way; a lesson that pride goes before a fall.

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(a) The writer's father warned the boys against going out at night because recent happenings had shown that it was unsafe. (b) 'A stone's throw from ours' indicates a very short distance. (c) The powerful headlights of his (the teacher's) car enabled him spot the boys. (d) In a bid to escape, he wanted to hurriedly get down and follow suit. In the process, he lost his balance and fell heavily sustaining injury on his arm. (e) He trusted that his son was (still) on his bed sleeping and could not have been outside as the teacher claimed. (f) (i) It is a noun phrase. (ii) It functions as the object of the verb 'raised'. (g) (i) It is a simile. (ii) It means to be very speedy. (h) (i) recent — the latest; current; new (ii) delicious — detectable; luscious; mouthwatering (iii) stealthily — secretly; silently; furtively (iv) approaching — oncoming; advancing (v) spotted — seen; noticed; caught sight of (vi) verify — confirm; bear out; check out

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(a) (i) Availability of health facilities has led to a steady decrease in death rate and increase in birthrate. (ii) Access to education has increase people's awareness of unhealthy practices inimical to their welfare. (iii) Increase in food supply has reduced malnutrition and starvation. (iv) The world has enjoyed relative security of lives due to absence of wars. (b) (i) The earth will not be able to accommodate the whole human race. (ii) It will lead to environmental pollution.