Темы по английскому языку для школы

Britain in Brief.

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland with an area of 244 000 square miles is situated on the British Isles, which are separated from the European continent by the North Sea, the Strait of Dover and the English Channel. Britain’s population is over 56 million. Four out of every five people live in towns. The largest cities of the country are London, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

The UK is a monarchy: the head of the state is a king or a queen. In practice, the Sovereign reigns, but does not rule: the UK is governed by the Government. The present Sovereign is Queen Elizabeth II.

The territory of Great Britain is small. Yet the country has a wide variety of scenery.

The heart of Britain is England. It is the richest, the most fertile and most populated in the country. The north and the west of England are mountainous, but all the rest of territory is a vast plain. In Northwest England, there are many beautiful lakes with green, wooded or grassy shores and grey mountains all around.

The smallest of Britain’s countries is Wales. The largest part of Wales is covered with rocky mountains, which are difficult to climb. Most people in Wales live in the coastal plains.

Scotland is a land of mountains, wild moorlands, narrow valleys and plains, famous lakes and no end of large and small islands. The Highlands of Scotland are among the oldest mountains in the world. One-third of the people in Scotland

live in or near its capital, Edinburgh, and its great industrial center, Glasgow.

The capital of Great Britain, London, stands on the Thames. The Thames is the busiest and the most important river in Great Britain, but it is not very long. The climate of Great Britain is mild.

Robert Burns.

Robert Burns is the national poet of Scotland. In his poems Burns sang the beauty and the glory of his native land.

Burns was born in Alloway, near Ayr, on 25 of January 1759. His father, a small farmer, was a hard-working man. When Robert was 6, he was sent to a school at Alloway Miln. Robert and his brother Gilbert were given a good knowledge of English. They progressed rapidly in reading and writing.

For some years Burns worked on the family field, plugging and reaping. The combination of hard physical labour and poor food in his youth that brought about the first symptoms of the heart disease which troubled him for much of his life and from which he died.

Burns wrote his first poem at the age of 14 for a girl who worked with him in the fields. After father’s death he immigrated to Jamaica. His most creative years were probably 1785 and 1786. During this period Burns wrote his most brilliant poems. Burns published his poems in August 1786. The success was great.

Soon, in April 1787, a second edition of his poems appeared in Edinburgh; 3000 copies were printed – a very large number for those times!

Now Burns had the opportunity to see more of his native land which he so dearly loved. He visited some historic places, which made a great impression on him.

During the last 5 years of his life Burns wrote some of his best poems and songs. After a short illness he died on 21 July 1796.

London.

London is the capital of the United Kingdom, its economic, political and cultural center. It is one of the world’s most important ports and one of the largest cities in the world. London with its suburbs has a population of about 11 million people.

London has been a capital for nearly a thousand years. Many of its ancient buildings still stand. The most famous of them are the Tower of London, Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Most visitors also want to see the Houses of Parliament and the many magnificent museums.

Once London was a small Roman town of the north bank of the Thames. Slowly it grew into one of the world’s major cities.

Different areas of London seem like different cities. The West End is a rich man’s world of shops, offices and theatres. The City of London is the district where most offices and banks are concentrated; the Royal Exchange and the Bank of England are here, too. The East End is a district where mostly working people live. The old port area is now called «Docklands». There are now new office buildings in Docklands, and thousands of new flats and houses.

By the day the whole of London is busy. At night, offices are quiet and empty, but the West End stays alive, because this is where Londoners come to enjoy themselves. There are two opera houses here, several concert halls and many theatres, as well as cinemas. In nearby Soho the pubs and restaurants and nightclubs are busy half the night

Moscow.

Moscow is the capital of Russia, its political, economic and cultural center. It was founded 8 centuries ago by Prince Yuri Dolgoruky. Historians have accepted the year of 1147 as the start of Moscow’s history. Gradually the city became more and more powerful. In the 13^th century Moscow was the center of the struggle of Russian lands for the liberation from the tartar yoke. In the 16^th century under Ivan the Terrible Moscow became the capital of