E n g L i s h jenni Currie Santamaria

Part of your brain health program can include a lesson or two on 
meditation so you can engage in this behavior on a daily basis. Fortunately, 
other cultures have already embraced the power of meditation and the beneits 
derived from deep introspection.
Source: 
Save Your Brain: 5 Things You Must Do to Keep Your Mind Young and 
Sharp
, by Paul David Nussbaum, New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010

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_____ 3.
Your brain can adapt to a chaotic world, but it will function more 
efficiently
over a longer period of time if you provide moments of 
inward r
election and rest.
_____ 4.
Fortunately
, other cultures have already embraced the power of 
meditation and the beneits derived from deep introspection.
_____ 5.
Sometimes music helps when you 
retreat
to your spiritual place.
_____ 6.
While that is easily said and understood, it is also very dificult to 
change 
behavior
.
a.
the ways you act
b.
go to a quiet place
c.
having good luck
d.
in the best way with the least waste of time and effort
e.
harmony and evenness among the parts of something
f.
shift attention from the outside world toward the mind or the self
B.
Use the new words
Complete the sentences with the boldface words from Exercise A.
1.
A human body has ________________, with two arms, legs, and ears on 
both sides.
2.
In school, the children have good ________________ and generally don’t 
goof around.
3.
________________ and thinking deeply about my goals helps me stay 
focused.
4.
If I work ________________ I won’t use all of my energy and time.
5.
After a busy week, I just want to ________________ to the seaside and relax.
6.
________________, I brought enough warm clothes with me, as the weather 
was exceptionally cold.
V. UNDERSTANDING GRAMMAR: ADVERBS OF OPINION
A.
Read about adverbs of opinion
Adverbs of opinion express a speaker’s viewpoint, opinion, or belief about an 
idea or situation.
Most adverbs of opinion can be placed at the beginning of a sentence, 
followed by a comma.
Unfortunately, 
I failed my driver’s test.
Adverbs of opinion may also be placed before a verb.
I 
unfortunately
 failed my driver’s test.

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Better Reading English
Here are twenty common adverbs of opinion ending in -ly:
fortunately happily 
honestly
basically 
luckily 
undoubtedly seriously
naturally obviously apparently surprisingly
personally strangely surely 
certainly
admittedly surprisingly clearly 
assuredly
VI. READ IT AGAIN
Rewrite each sentence. Add the adverb of opinion
.
1.
She remembered to take her keys. [luckily]
2.
We will be on time for the movie. [surely]
3.
I will need to change some of my behaviors. [clearly]
4.
He doesn’t like to relax on the weekends. [strangely]
5.
They don’t like going to the mountains. [honestly]
6.
I wouldn’t recommend jogging at night. [personally]
7.
She knows how to play several different instruments. [surprisingly]
8.
We can’t take a broken car on the trip. [obviously]
VII. READ IT AGAIN
Read the excerpt again. Answer the questions.
1.
What are the beneits of spirituality?
2.
What are the beneits of meditation?

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SUCCESS AT SURFING
I. PRE-READING
A.
Background information
This excerpt is taken from the book 
Wingnut’s Complete Surfing
, by Robert 
“Wingnut” Weaver. If you’re near an ocean, suring may just be the experience 
you need to get some exercise while getting in touch with nature. Suring is a 
great pastime, not only in the United States, in places like California and Hawaii, 
but around the world as well.
B.
Words to know before you read
Match the words to their definitions.
____ 1.
suring 
a. becoming strong and healthier by 
exercising
____ 2.
sedentary 
b. 
not inluenced or affected by something
____ 3.
immersed 
c. to cause someone to feel admiration
____ 4.
synthesis 
d. an award or expression of praise
____ 5.
conditioning 
e. something that is very popular for a 
period of time
____ 6.
prospective 
f. sport of riding ocean waves
____ 7.
immune 
g. to become smaller or less
____ 8.
malleable 
h. easily spread to other people
____ 9.
impress 
i. likely to happen in the future
____ 10.
accolades 
j. involving a lot of sitting
____ 11.
craze 
k. combination of different things
____ 12.
waned 
l. easily changed
____ 13.
infectious 
m. to take in or become engaged in 
completely
C.
Reading strategy
Skim the article quickly, and write the answer to the question.
Why is suring considered a “personal activity”?

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Better Reading English
II. READ
Read the text. Mark the words you don’t know, but don’t stop reading to look 
them up.
Surfing Success
Can you remember, as a child, giving yourself wholly to the pursuit of an activity 
that brought you joy? It might have been swimming, shooting baskets, ishing, 
or some more sedentary activity, but while you were engaged in it hours would 
melt away unnoticed. When we come of age and in all likelihood are forced to 
spend an inordinate amount of time earning money, we forget the timeless joy 
of undistracted engagement in an activity pursued for its own sake. We forget 
how to play.
Suring takes you back there. It makes you feel like a kid again. Even for the 
average, garden-variety participant, suring is such a unique synthesis of 
physical exercise and conditioning, intellectual stimulation, and immersion in 
natural beauty, and is just so downright happy and thrilling, few who experience 
it can ever let it go. Suring makes your soul smile.
Whether you start playing the guitar, taking golf lessons, training for 
marathons, acting, writing, learning martial arts, or participating on a sports 
team, you usually have an ultimate goal, conscious or unconscious, and you 
keep running and rerunning a cost-beneit analysis relative to that goal—
prospective pain versus prospective gain. When will you consider yourself 
successful? When you receive an award, a trophy, or public acclaim?
Suring is hardly immune from this sort of thinking, but success in suring is 
fundamentally different. Maybe this is because of suring’s malleable, highly 
luid nature and the fact that success is so completely deined by the