ACADEMIC LISTENING TEST PRACTICE
PEOPLE - STEVE JOBS
PEOPLE - STEVE JOBS
For Students Preparing for Academic Tests / IELTS and TOEFL
Listen as you read the script.
Playing Time: 2 minutes 25 seconds
Hello class, let me start off with a simple question. How many of you here today own at least one of the following items: an iPad, iPod, iPhone, a smartwatch or a Mac computer? If you don’t have one of these things, well then, chances are you probably know someone who has one (or at least someone who wants one)! Steve Jobs created the company – Apple – that created these things that are now such an important part of our lives, as well as the lives of millions of people the world over. And, yes, as you may have guessed by now, Steve Jobs is the topic of our discussion today.
Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, in San Francisco, California. Because his birth parents were unmarried at the time, his mother decided to give him up for adoption. She agreed to let Paul and Clara Jobs raise her son as their own, but only if they agreed to pay for Steve’s education when he was older. Steve Jobs expressed a lot of curiosity about the world as he was growing up. When he was a boy, he had a special hobby: he liked to take apart televisions and put them back together again. He was a gifted student in school and even skipped grade five in elementary school, jumping from grade four into grade six, and in 1972, when he was only seventeen, he graduated from high school. He then began his studies in Reed College, in Portland, Oregon, but dropped out after only six months.
Deciding to quit was not at all easy. It was difficult, but as Jobs later said, “I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.” Two years later in 1974, he travelled to India, and learned about Zen Buddhism. After Steve Jobs returned to the United States, he found a job as a video game designer at a company called Atari, and two years after that, in 1976, when he was only twenty-one years old, he created his own company – Apple Computer – with his friend, Steve Wozniak. Steve Jobs later got married in 1991 and had four children. Unfortunately, however, doctors discovered that he had pancreatic cancer in 2003, and in 2011 he died at the age of only 56.
Unfortunately, our time is up. In our next class, we’ll continue by looking more closely at Steve Jobs’ time at Reed College, and also his seven months in India, in search of spiritual enlightenment.
Jobs was born on February 24, 1955, in San Francisco, California. Because his birth parents were unmarried at the time, his mother decided to give him up for adoption. She agreed to let Paul and Clara Jobs raise her son as their own, but only if they agreed to pay for Steve’s education when he was older. Steve Jobs expressed a lot of curiosity about the world as he was growing up. When he was a boy, he had a special hobby: he liked to take apart televisions and put them back together again. He was a gifted student in school and even skipped grade five in elementary school, jumping from grade four into grade six, and in 1972, when he was only seventeen, he graduated from high school. He then began his studies in Reed College, in Portland, Oregon, but dropped out after only six months.
Deciding to quit was not at all easy. It was difficult, but as Jobs later said, “I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.” Two years later in 1974, he travelled to India, and learned about Zen Buddhism. After Steve Jobs returned to the United States, he found a job as a video game designer at a company called Atari, and two years after that, in 1976, when he was only twenty-one years old, he created his own company – Apple Computer – with his friend, Steve Wozniak. Steve Jobs later got married in 1991 and had four children. Unfortunately, however, doctors discovered that he had pancreatic cancer in 2003, and in 2011 he died at the age of only 56.
Unfortunately, our time is up. In our next class, we’ll continue by looking more closely at Steve Jobs’ time at Reed College, and also his seven months in India, in search of spiritual enlightenment.
The childhood home of Steve Jobs (Los Altos, California)
Note: For more cool ESL resources about computers and Steve Jobs, visit my All Things Topics site.
