A Tale of Genuises

A TALE OF GENUISES

Here are some true-life stories of geniuses. Read them and find titles for these two texts:

I.Tom Hadfied, aged 16, is the creator of a £ 15 million Internet business. Here his father talks about life with a genius:

‘Tom was two when he got his first computer and by the age of three he had learnt how to break into the program and change sides every time the computer was going to beat him at chess. He has never liked coming second

He’s always been bored at school but has managed to keep himself out of trouble by playing regular football. In fact he’s been offered a career as a professional goalkeeper.

For his 12th birthday we got him wired up to the Internet and from that day on school was forgotten. He rapidly created Soccernet, now the world's most popular football web site, worth over £15 million. He regularly spends 12 hours a day at the keyboard but rarely watches television. Tom hopes to go to Oxford University to study politics, philosophy and economics continue to play football and run a global business in his spare time.’

II. Billy Sidis, a child in the 1920s, was described as ‘the most remarkable boy in the US.’

He taught himself Latin at four and could read and speak eight languages when he was six. At 11 he gave a celebrated lecture on four-dimensional existence to Harvard University Mathematical Club. He was a genius until everything began to go wrong. His parents had neglected to develop his social skills and Billy did not know how to dress himself properly even by the time he was an adolescent.. Socially and emotionally immature, he suffered a mental breakdown and died at 46, creator of no great achievements.

III. Skim reading the article. Think of a good title for it and compare it with other students' titles:

YOUR BRAIN is like a sleeping giant. During recent years, research has shown that the brain is much more intelligent than we ever imagined. Even the commonly-heard statement that, on average, we use only one percent of our brain may well be wrong. It now seems that we use even less than one per cent, which means that an enormous amount of our brain can still be developed. A good example of what the brain is capable of is a man called 'K'. He was famous for having a perfect memory. If you asked him what happened to him on a particular day fifteen years before, he could not only tell you but would pause for a moment and then ask, “At What time?” His extraordinary ability was studied for many years by a psychologist who finally concluded that, at a very early age, K’s brain had the power to learn every detail about his life. Apart from that, K was like any other human being. Another example is a young man called Dario Donatelli. He has recently graduated from a university in Pittsburgh, where he has specialised in techniques for remembering numbers. He describes himself as quite normal, stating, 'My memory is just like anyone else's. There are probably thousands of people whose memories could work faster than mine if they had the same interest in numbers as I have.” He has become one of the great memorisers of all time, and broken the world record of memorising the largest amount of numbers. He recently memorised a number of seventy three digits. When asked how he did this, he replied, 'I grouped the numbers into pairs, of threes or fours, and I link them with something I am familiar with, for example my brother's age, a date of birth, a month of the year. He can now remember almost 100 numbers at any one time. However, realistically, could we all do the same? The important thing to remember is that our brain actually improves with time and practice. The more we do to encourage it to learn the more successful it will be. So, perhaps the best advice might be to take a trip to the local library or bookshop, buy a book or something that has always interested us but which we know very little about, remember to read it regularly and see how quickly we can train our minds to learn something completely new and different. We may be surprised of what we can achieve.

(Adapted from Tony Buzan Make the most of your mind, Colt Books Ltd)

A. Now answer these questions:

1. What lessons about genius do you think can be learnt by what happened to Billy Sidis? Would things be different now?

2. Do you think there are any dangers that Tom Hadfied could have similar problems? What advice would you give him and his father’s?

3. If you noticed that a friend’s quiet little three-year-old sister could read fluently and do complicated maths problems, what would you do and why?

B. Here are five expressions from the texts. Explain them in your own words:

a. to break into the program

b. we got him wired up to the Internet

c. a global business

d. a celebrated lecture

e. creator of no achievements

C. Complete this text with the correct prepositions: of, with, at, without, in, for, about

Scientists tell us that our brain will improve ………practice, but some people are born geniuses. Albert Einstein, for example, was capable using more of his brain than most people. Einstein was born Germany in 1879. Amazingly, ……… school Einstein's teachers thought he wasn't good sciences and treated him badly. They did not know that by the age of 26, this young student would be famous changing the way scientists think. At first Einstein's ideas ……… science were so new and strange that many people couldn't understand them. However, nowadays students who specialise Physics university all study his theories. Nearly all areas of Physics were changed by Einstein and his work lasers, television, computers, space travel, and many other things we are familiar today would not exist.

D. The power of our mind and memory: Look at these numbers and objects for 30 seconds and try to memorise them. Now, without looking at them, write down the numbers and objects you can remember, then compare your list with a partner's. Which were easier to remember?

E. a. Choose the sentences which are true for you and develop short personal descriptions:

1. Memorising numbers is much more difficult than memorising words.

2. I like studying Chemistry even less now than when I was younger.

3. Lectures at university are quite interesting.

4. My best friend and I are just like each other.

5. I know very little about the meaning of dreams.

E. b. Now rewrite the sentences which weren't true for you. Use these adverbs: a lot, nothing,like,even,more,very,much,less,not-at-all.
Example: I like studying Chemistry even more now than when I was younger.

F. The more you read, the better your spelling will be. What is the difference between advice and advise and practice and practise? Are they verbs or nouns? Is there any difference in the pronunciation of -ise in advise and practise? Look up for other pairs in the dictionary and make the difference.

advice/advise: The teacher him to work harder for his exams.

If you take my you’ll work harder.

practice/ practise: If you want to improve your memory, memorising lists of numbers.

The more you do, the better your memory will become.

G. Confusing words: remember/ remind

1. Can you me to buy some stamps?

2. Tim………..to post the letter.

3. Pam didn't………….talking to Paul at the party.

4. me to go to the dentist tomorrow.

H.1. Write a tale of a genius which can either be based on someone you know or know of, or it can be purely imaginary. See the example below:

- 'I actually know a genius- he's five and he's a genius on the clarinet. Neither of his parents can read a note of music. His teacher thinks he's a reincarnation of a famous musician. He knows things nobody could ever have taught him.

H.2. Comment on the following:

- Do you know the old quotation: genius is one per cent inspiration and ninety-nine per cent perspiration? Well, that's what I believe!

- Genius is no accident. It's a question of early upbringing. People always say Mozart was a genius but his father was a court musician so it's not so very surprising.

- 'I'm glad I'm not a genius Imagine how lonely it must be to be different from everyone else.'

- 'Why is genius always connected with music and science? Why can't you be a genius at making toast or buying trainers?