Reading — 2026 Jan–Apr Recall Set 20

The earliest stringed instruments currently known to archaeologists are bowl harps. For millennia, people made bowl harps using, for example, tortoise shells as resonators, with a bent stick for a neck and one or more gut or silk strings. The world’s museums contain many such harps from the ancient Sumerian, Babylonian, and Egyptian civilisations. Around 2500-2000 BC, more advanced harps, such as the beautifully carved 11-stringed instrument found in the tomb of Queen Shub-Ad in ancient Mesopotamia, now modern-day Iraq, started to appear. The tanbur probably developed from the bowl harp. It was different from the bowl harp in that its neck was straightened out to allow the strings to be pressed down to create more notes. Tomb paintings and stone carvings in Egypt indicate that harps and tanburs – plus flutes and percussion instruments – were being played together 3,500-4,000 years ago. Archaeologists have also found many similar relics amongst the ruins of the ancient Mesopotamian civilisation. Many of these instruments have survived into modern times in almost unchanged form, for example, folk instruments of the region such as the Turkish saz and Afghan panchtar. At 3,500 years old, the tanbur which belonged to the Egyptian singer Har-Mose is the earliest known example of this instrument. Har-Mose’s tanbur had three strings and a plectrum suspended from the neck by a cord. The soundbox, which increased the volume, was made of beautifully polished cedarwood and covered in rawhide. It can be seen today at the Archaeological Museum in Cairo. In order to distinguish guitars from other stringed instruments, it is helpful to have a broad definition of the guitar. Music expert Dr Michael Kasha defines a guitar as having ‘a long, fretted neck, flat wooden soundboard, ribs, and a flat back, most often with sides that curve inwards’. The oldest known visual representation of such an instrument is a stone carving at Alaca Huyuk in Turkey, which shows a 3,300-year-old instrument with a long neck and sides that clearly curve inwards. The name ‘guitar’ comes from the ancient Sanskrit word for ‘string’ – ‘tar’. Many popular stringed instruments used in Central Asia today have existed in an unchanged form for several thousand years, as shown by archaeological finds in the area. Many have names that end in ‘tar’, with a prefix indicating the number of strings, such as the doter, a two-stringed instrument found in Turkestan, and the Persian three-stringed setar and four-stringed chartar. The Indian sitar almost certainly took its name from the setar, but over the centuries it evolved radically, following the Indians’ own aesthetic and cultural ideals. Tanburs and harps spread around the ancient world with travellers, merchants and seamen. The earliest guitar-like instruments to arrive in Europe had, most often, four strings. Many such instruments, and variations with from three to five strings, can be seen in mediaeval illustrated manuscripts. They were also carved in stone in European churches and cathedrals, from the first century AD through until the 13th century. When the four-stringed Persian chartar arrived in Spain, however, it changed in form and construction, acquiring pairs of strings tuned to the same note instead of single strings. It became known as the chitarra. By the middle of the 14th century, the chitarra had become dominant, at least in most of Europe. The earliest known music for the eight-stringed chitarra was written in 16th-century Spain. The ten-string version first appeared in Italy at the same time, and gradually replaced the eight-stringed instrument. A further two strings first appeared in the 17th century, an innovation which guitar makers all over Europe quickly took up. However, this twelve-string arrangement gradually gave way to six single strings across the continent. The six-stringed guitar can thus be said to be a development of the twelve-string, rather than vice versa, as was thought previously. At the beginning of the 19th century, the present-day guitar began to take shape, although bodies were still fairly small and narrow-waisted. The modern classical guitar first appeared in its current form in the mid-19th century, when the Spanish guitar maker Antonio Torres increased the size of the body, altered its proportions, and introduced the revolutionary fan-braced top. His design radically increased the volume and improved the tone of the instrument, and very soon became the norm. This design has remained essentially unchanged to this day. At the time when Torres made his breakthrough, German immigrants to America – among them Christian Friedrich Martin – began making guitars with X-braced tops. Steel strings, which became widely available several decades later in the early 1900s, offered the promise of a much louder guitar, but the increased tension was too much for the fan-braced top. The stronger X-braced top proved equal to the job, and quickly became the industry standard. At the end of the 19th century, guitar manufacturer Orville Gibson added steel strings to a body constructed like a cello, a combination which produced more volume. The electric guitar was born when pickups were fitted to Hawaiian and jazz guitars in the late 1920s, but met with little success until 1936, when Gibson introduced its famous ES150 model.

A. The term graffiti derives from the Italian graffito meaning ‘scratching’ and can be defined as uninvited marking or writing scratched or applied to objects, built structures and natural features. It is not a new phenomenon: examples can be found on ancient structures around the world, in some cases predating the Greeks and Romans. In such circumstances it has acquired invaluable historical and archaeological significance, providing a social history of life and events at that time. Graffiti is now a problem that has become pervasive, as a result of the availability of cheap and quick means of mark-making. B. It is usually considered a priority to remove graffiti as quickly as possible after it appears. This is for several reasons. The first is to prevent ‘copy-cat’ emulation which can occur rapidly once a clean surface is defaced. It may also be of a racist or otherwise offensive nature and many companies and councils have a policy of removing this type of graffiti within an hour or two of it being reported. Also, as paints, glues and inks dry out over time they can become increasingly difficult to remove and are usually best dealt with as soon as possible after the incident. Graffiti can also lead to more serious forms of vandalism and, ultimately, the deterioration of an area, contributing to social decline. C. Although graffiti may be regarded as an eyesore, any proposal to remove it from sensitive historic surfaces should be carefully considered: techniques designed for more robust or utilitarian surfaces may result in considerable damage. In the event of graffiti incidents, it is important that the owners of buildings or other structures and their consultants are aware of the approach they should take in dealing with the problem. The police should be informed as there may be other related attacks occurring locally. An incidence pattern can identify possible culprits, as can stylised signatures or nicknames, known as ‘tags’, which may already be familiar to local police. Photographs are useful to record graffiti incidents and may assist the police in bringing a prosecution. Such images are also required for insurance claims and can be helpful in cleaning operatives, allowing them to see the problem area before arriving on site. D. There are a variety of methods that are used to remove graffiti. Broadly these divide between chemical and mechanical systems. Chemical preparations are based on dissolving the media; these solvents can range from water to potentially hazardous chemical ‘cocktails’. Mechanical systems such as wire-brushing and grit-blasting attempt to abrade or chip the media from the surface. Care should be taken to comply with health and safety legislation with regard to the protection of both passers-by and any person carrying out the cleaning. Operatives should follow product guidelines in terms of application and removal, and wear the appropriate protective equipment. Measures must be taken to ensure that run-off, aerial mists, drips and splashes do not threaten unprotected members of the public. When examining a graffiti incident it is important to assess the ability of the substrate to withstand the prescribed treatment. If there is any doubt regarding this, then small trial areas should be undertaken to assess the impact of more extensive treatment. E. A variety of preventive strategies can be adopted to combat a recurring problem of graffiti at a given site. As no two sites are the same, no one set of protection measures will be suitable for all situations. Each site must be looked at individually. Surveillance systems such as closed-circuit television may also help. In cities and towns around the country, prominently placed cameras have been shown to reduce anti-social behavior of all types including graffiti. Security patrols will also act as a deterrent to prevent recurring attacks. However, the cost of this may be too high for most situations. A physical barrier such as a wall, railings, doors or gates can be introduced to discourage unauthorized access to a vulnerable site. However, consideration has to be given to the impact measures have on the structure being protected. In the worst cases, they can be almost as damaging to the quality of the environment as the graffiti they prevent. In others, they might simply provide a new surface for graffiti. F. One of the most significant problems associated with graffiti removal is the need to remove it from surfaces that are repeatedly attacked. Under these circumstances, the repeated removal of graffiti using even the most gentle methods will ultimately cause damage to the surface material. There may be situations where the preventive strategies mentioned above do not work or are not a viable proposition at a given site. Anti-graffiti coatings are usually applied by brush or spray leaving a thin veneer that essentially serves to isolate the graffiti from the surface. G. Removal of graffiti from a surface that has been treated in this way is much easier, usually using low-pressure water which reduces the possibility of damage. Depending on the type of barrier selected it may be necessary to reapply the coating after each graffiti removal exercise.

A Of all the ideas for improving education, few are as simple or attractive as reducing the number of pupils per teacher. Unlike competing proposals for reform, class-size reductions rarely elicit huge outcries or involve structural change. The testing of educators, by contrast, generally arouses the anger of unions. Similarly, establishing special ‘charter’ schools involves privileging some schools over others, with the credits provided usually coming out of the budgets of struggling local schools. With its uncomplicated appeal, class-size reduction in the U.S. has lately gone from being a subject of primary academic interest to a policy juggernaut with over twenty states aiming at decreasing class sizes. B Do small classes improve school achievement? To answer this, investigators have attempted to analyse existing data, such as records at the U.S. Department of Education. These reveal that there were steep drops in pupil-teacher ratios between 1969 and 1997, but no significant gains in academic performance. But do these findings mean that class size makes no difference? Not necessarily. For instance, schools strive for more than just high test scores; they also usually try to keep their drop-out rates low. And, indeed, the drop-out rate for older students fell considerably over that period. Because drop-outs generally come from the low end of the achievement distribution, a reduction in the drop-out rate could be expected to pull down average test scores. Another reason for discounting those data is the difficulty of ensuring a level playing field. In a perfect world, U.S. students would all come from well-off families, with two highly educated English-speaking parents who are involved in their children’s schooling. Teachers would all be creative and have complete mastery of the subject matter. The reality is very different. C Over the past 35 years, some studies of existing data have produced evidence that smaller classes benefit students, but most of these studies were poorly designed. The exception was the Tennessee study called Project STAR (Student Teacher Achievement Ratio). Frederick Mosteller of Harvard University has called it ‘one of the greatest experiments in education in United States history’. Students entering kindergarten were randomly assigned to one of three kinds of classes: a small class of 13 to 17 students, a regular-size class of 22 to 26 or a regular-size class with both a teacher and a full-time teacher’s aide. The students remained in whatever category they had been assigned to throughout the third grade, after which they joined a regular classroom in the fourth. To ensure that teaching quality did not differ, teachers were randomly assigned to small and regular-size classrooms. Few teachers received any special training for working with small classes, and there were no new curricular materials. D At the end of STAR, researchers analysed the data. Jeremy Finn of New York University and Charles Achilles of Eastern Michigan University found evidence for ‘an array of benefits of small classes’. They calculated that students in smaller classes were outperforming their counterparts in regular-sized classes by the first grade and that this advantage persisted even after students returned to larger classes. They also found that the effect was stronger for black and Hispanic minority groups – a significant finding for policy-makers. Eric Hanushek of Stanford, however, criticises some of STAR’s key conclusions. He argues that STAR does not prove that gains persist long after students return to regular classes. It was debatable how much later improvement stemmed from other factors, such as a supportive home. Nor does he accept that the benefits accumulate, with participants widening the gap with their peers in larger classes year by year. Hanushek and others have also shown that during the study too many children moved from regular to small classes, probably because school personnel caved in to parent demands. And Hanushek also asserts that STAR failed to ensure good randomisation of teacher and student assignments. However, these points do not undermine STAR’s basic findings. E The largest public class size reduction programme so far, California’s, stands more as a warning than as worthy of emulation. That state is trying to reduce classes in kindergarten through grade three despite a shortage of teachers that is most acute in low-income areas. This is exacerbating the disparity in resources available to rich and poor schools in California, because more affluent areas can attract the best teachers. Indeed, some of the extra teachers needed are being recruited from the poorer schools. Researchers found a statistically significant achievement advantage in reading, writing and mathematics for students in classes that had been reduced to 20. What is more, the effect did not vary for students of different backgrounds. F Wisconsin’s Student Achievement Guarantee in Education (SAGE) was a five-year pilot study to do some of the groundwork for a major project. Class sizes were reduced in only 14 schools, but it was noteworthy for targeting schools at which 30% of the students were below poverty level, compared with California’s across-the-board approach. SAGE lowered the average pupil-teacher ratio in kindergarten through third grade to 12–15:1 from 21–25:1. Analysts have studied the results of first-grade students in these schools and similar first-grade students elsewhere and found the results accord with those from STAR. STAR and SAGE have made it hard to argue against reducing class sizes. But the California initiative shows that reductions made with too little forethought can yield minuscule gains. Administrators need solid information before they can make sensible policy decisions.