ICSE English Language 2020 – free specimen / practice paper
ENGLISH LANGUAGE
ENGLISH Paper 1
(Two hours)
Answers to this Paper must be written on the paper provided separately.
You will not be allowed to write during the first 15 minutes.
This time is to be spent in reading the question paper.
The time given at the head of this Paper is the time allowed for writing the answers.
Attempt all four questions.
The intended marks for questions or parts of questions are given in brackets [ ].
You are advised to spend not more than 35 minutes in answering Question 1
and 20 minutes in answering Question 2.
Question 1
(Do not spend more than 25 minutes on this question.) [20]
Write a composition (350 - 400 words) on any one of the following:
(a) Write an original short story that begin with the words “The lights turned
green, and our bus started moving forward.”
(b) You arrived home late in the evening from a family function, to find that some
people from your neighbourhood have surrounded your next-door neighbour’s
house. Describe what you discovered. How did you and your family react ?
(c) Owing to a prolonged spell of illness you missed out on a number of days in
school one term. You recovered in time to attend the last two weeks of classes
before your term-end examinations. Explain your routine and how you
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managed to cope up with the extra work in the two weeks leading up to the
examinations.
(d) Young minds should not be exposed to the harsh brutalities of war reporting.
Express your views either for or against this statement.
(e) Study the picture given below. Write a story or a description or an account of
that it suggests to you. Your composition may be about the subject of the
picture or you may take suggestions from it; however, there must be a clear
connection between the picture and your composition.
Question 2
(Do not spend more than 20 minutes on this question.)
Select one of the following: [10]
(a) Write a letter to the manager of a restaurant where you had visited for a meal,
thanking them for the wonderful experience and food. Explain how the entire
team at the restaurant managed to exceed your expectations and make it a
memorable experience for you.
(b) Write a letter to a friend you made, while he/she had come visiting your city
last year, explaining a how you celebrate a popular festival in your locality.
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Describe a little about the history of the festival, how everyone celebrates it
and how it is special for you.
Question 3 [5+5]
(a) You are a volunteer at a local charity
You are organising the sale of some handicrafts that some volunteers have
made for the charity. Write a notice that is to be put up at local supermarkets
and public utility offices, providing details of the date and time, the venue as
well as any other details relevant.
(b) Write an e-mail to the manager of one such public utility office asking them to
support this sale by encouraging their staff to visit the sale.
Question 4
Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions that follow:
My father’s family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant
tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So, I
called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.
I give Pirrip as my father’s family name, on the authority of his tombstone and my
sister, —Mrs. Joe Gargery, who married the blacksmith. As I never saw my father or 5
my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long
before the days of photographs), my first fancies regarding what they were like were
unreasonably derived from their tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father’s,
gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From
the character and turn of the inscription, “Also Georgiana Wife of the Above,” I drew 10
a childish conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly. To five little stone
lozenges, each about a foot and a half long, which were arranged in a neat row beside
their grave, and were sacred to the memory of five little brothers of mine, —who gave
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up trying to get a living, exceedingly early in that universal struggle, —I am indebted
for a belief I religiously entertained that they had all been born on their backs with 15
their hands in their trousers-pockets, and had never taken them out in this state of
existence.
Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound, twenty
miles of the sea. My first most vivid and broad impression of the identity of things
seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening. At 20
such a time I found out for certain that this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the
churchyard; and that Philip Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the
above, were dead and buried; and that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias,
and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried; and that the
dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dikes and mounds and 25
gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; and that the low leaden line
beyond was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing
was the sea; and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning
to cry, was Pip.
“Hold your noise!” cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among the graves 30
at the side of the church porch. “Keep still, you little devil, or I’ll cut your throat!”
A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with no hat, and
with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied round his head. A man who had been
soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and
stung by nettles, and torn by briars; who limped, and shivered, and glared, and 35
growled; and whose teeth chattered in his head as he seized me by the chin.
“Oh! Don’t cut my throat, sir,” I pleaded in terror. “Pray don’t do it, sir.”
“Tell us your name!” said the man. “Quick!”
“Pip, sir.”
“Once more,” said the man, staring at me. “Give it mouth!” 40
“Pip. Pip, sir.”
“Show us where you live,” said the man. “Pint out the place!”
I pointed to where our village lay, on the flat in-shore among the alder-trees and
pollards, a mile or more from the church.
45
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The man, after looking at me for a moment, turned me upside down, and emptied my
pockets. There was nothing in them but a piece of bread. When the church came to
itself, —for he was so sudden and strong that he made it go head over heels before
me, and I saw the steeple under my feet,—when the church came to itself, I say, I was
seated on a high tombstone, trembling while he ate the bread ravenously. 50
“You young dog,” said the man, licking his lips, “what fat cheeks you ha’ got.”
I believe they were fat, though I was at that time undersized for my years, and not
strong.
“Darn me if I couldn’t eat em,” said the man, with a threatening shake of his head,
“and if I han’t half a mind to’t!” 55
I earnestly expressed my hope that he wouldn’t, and held tighter to the tombstone on
which he had put me; partly, to keep myself upon it; partly, to keep myself from
crying.
Adapted from Great Expectations - by Charles Dickens
(a) Give the meanings of the following words as used in the passage.
One-word answers or short phrases will be accepted.
(i) derived (line 8)
(ii) exceedingly (line 14)
(iii) smothered (line 34) [3]
(b) Answer the following questions briefly in your own words.
(i) What was Pip's full name? [2]
(ii) Why had he not seen his parents? [1]
(iii) What was his idea about their physical appearance and from where had
he got this idea? [2]
(iv) What was the place where Pip had a very vivid memory? [2]
(v) What did the person that Pip met look like? [2]
(c) Describe with close reference to the section of the extract between lines 45 and
line 50, and in not more than 50 words, what the man did to Pip to find food. [8]
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Question 5
(a) In the following passage, fill in each of the numbered blanks with the correct
form of the word given in brackets. Do not copy the passage, but write in
correct serial order the word or phrase appropriate to the blank space.
Example:
(0) came
The clouds (0) ______(come) up from nowhere. The sea (1) ______(turn)
choppy and the boat (2) ______(start) to roll. We (3) ______(be) more than
four nautical miles from the shore. The oil we had (4) ______(be) just enough
to last us until the shore, in calm waters. The extra fuel (5) ______(burn) in
navigating through the crests and troughs of the waves meant that we
(6)______(be) in real danger of being (7)______(strand) out at sea. The single
[4]
engine motor of the boat just (8) ______(have) a single throttle level.
(b) Fill in the blanks with appropriate words
(i) My sister studied ____ university.
(ii) Mount Everest is 8800 metres ____ sea level.
(i) Emona sat ____ Sombit and Argha.
(iv) Congratulations ____ your promotion!
(v) There is a picture ____ the corner of my room.
(vi) The train to Dibrugarh stopped ____ the station.
(vii) There was an accident ____ the railway crossing.
[4]
(viii) Would you buy a bunch of flowers ____ your mother?
(c) Join the following sentences to make one complete sentence without using
and, but or so.
(i) Sasha fell down in the race. Sasha still came third.
(ii) Tharambu likes to volunteer at the local veterinary office. Tharambu
likes animals
(i) The cake mix was ready. Immediately it was put into the oven.
[4]
(iv) Brigitte played at home. All her friends played outside in the garden.
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(d) Re-write the following sentences according to the instructions given after each.
Make other changes that may be necessary, but do not change the meaning of
each sentence.
(i) It is possible she is telling the truth.
(Begin: She might well ….)
(ii) Without her help, I should never have passed.
(Begin: If she hadn't ….)
(iii) He was very reluctant to accompany his friend to the fair.
(Begin: It was ....)
(iv) The only way you can become a good footballer is by training hard
everyday.
(Begin: Only by ...)
(v) She has not been to my house since August.
(Begin: Her last ...)
(vi) However easy this technique looks, it takes years of practice.
(Begin: Easy ...........)
(vii) They are pulling down every one of these buildings.
(Begin: Everyone ……….)
(viii) Johan said, "Give the money to me and I will give it to him on
Monday"
(Begin: Johan told us to ...) [8]
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