Most likely number of contactable alien civilizations is 36

Level 3 l Advanced
KEY

1 Warmer 4 Out-of-this-world vocabulary

1. b. According to NASA, there are currently five (possible answers)

planets classified as dwarf planets: Ceres, Pluto, alien, astrobiological, astronomer, astrophysics,
Makemake, Haumea and Eris. The planets are cosmos, Earth, Enceladus, Europa, extrasolar planet,
Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, galaxy, Jupiter, light year, little green man, Mars, Milky
Uranus and Neptune. Way, mission, moon, planet, Saturn, solar system,
2. a. A light year is the distance that light travels in space, spaceship, star, Titan, universe
vacuum in one Julian year (365.25 days).
3. c. A light year measures 9.46 trillion kilometres.
4. b. 6 Space quotes
5. c.
Teacher’s note: Get the students to do this quiz in teams, 1. mankind
and see which team gets the most correct answers. 2. frontier
3. Control
4. Earth
2 Key words 5. star
6. beyond
1. equation 7. forty-two
2. detectable Teacher’s note: You could ask students to choose
3. assumption one quote from the seven here or another of their own
4. random choosing and research it further, reporting back with
5. speculative their findings.
6. conservative
7. unpicked
8. upbeat
9. evolved
10. quest

3 Comprehension check

1. F – New calculations have led to the assumption

that there are more than 30 other intelligent
civilizations in our galaxy.
2. T
3. F – The number is said to be conservative, so the
number of planets that could support life is likely to
be higher than 36.
4. F – We would need to survive for around another
6,000 years – 6,120, according to the article.
5. F – He says that they would have similarities in
appearance to life on Earth, and we wouldn’t be
very shocked by them.
6. T
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Published by Macmillan Education Ltd. © Macmillan Education Limited, 2020.

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NEWS LESSONS / Most likely number of contactable alien civilizations is 36 / Advanced

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