General English Level 4 Version 2.1 © 2004 acl Pty Ltd GELEV4 Unit 04 Topic 01.doc  DISCUSSION 05 How to be a survivor How do people such as Cynthia survive such terrible ordeals? Afterwards, Cynthia said: "You just do what you have to do. You find the energy from somewhere." Like Cynthia, other people have shown an almost superhuman will to survive in the most terrible situations. When they think they're going to die they find they have extraordinary mental and physical strength. They can ignore fear and pain and think only about surviving. Dr. Ralphus, a well known research scientist, says there are in fact real physical changes in people's bodies when they face death. The heart beats much faster to give them special strength. The brain turns down the emotions so that there is no sense of fear. The person can then concentrate on the threat at hand. What do you think is the most important reason why people survive life-threatening situations? Do you think it's luck? Or fitness? Courage? Good planning? Strength? Or something else? Dictionary ordeal ignore Vocabulary will to survive very strong desire to stay alive VOCABULARY Missing words 1. Choose 5 words from the reading text that you didn’t know before today. 2. Write a sentence using the word. Write the sentence in pencil. 3. When you are happy with your sentences, erase the words from the sentences so that you have spaces. 4. Give the sentences to your partner to complete. 117