The engineering profession

Text B.

Exercise 11. Read the text without a dictionary for 7 minutes

VI. Reading

Exercise 9. Make up the dialogues of your own on the following situations. Dramatize them.

Situation 1.

You have met your ex class-mate. Now you are students. Speak about your educational institutions, subjects to be studied at, subjects you are interested in, academic activities, courses of education and presupposed careers.

Situation 2.

Today is your first working day at the engineering enterprise. Speak with your chief about your duties.

Situation 3.

You are meeting foreign students. Tell them about the society’s requirements to a specialist, about your University and your faculty and future speciality.

Situation 4.

You are the chief engineer at the plant. Explain your new employee what he/she must be able to do.

Situation 5.

Your younger brother is eager to enter the University and to study at the mechanical engineering faculty. Answer all his questions about possible positions of a processing engineer.

Exercise 10. Speak on the topic “ Your speciality” using the following word-combinations:

Speciality - processing engineer

- to be much interested in;

- to choose as speciality;

- to be trained at higher schools;

- to be a part of engineering and machine-building;

- to be linked with other branches of industries: machine-tool and instrument manufacturing, production mechanization, automation equipment, quality control devices, output of measuring and control instruments;

- to be a good specialist everyone must know fundamentals and speciality forming subjects;

- training, to be done at the laboratories, scientific centers, shops, plants and different enterprises;

- degrees to be get at the University;

- the results to be implemented in the term-paper and graduation theses.

Engineering is one of the most ancient occupations in history. Without the skills included in the broad field of engineering, our present-day civilization never could have evolved. The first toolmakers who chipped arrows and spears from rock were the forerunners of modern mechanical engineers. The craftsmen who discovered metals in the earth and found ways to refine and use them were the ancestors of mining and metallurgical engineers. And the skilled technicians who devised irrigation systems and erected the marvellous buildings of the ancient world were the civil engineers of their time.

Engineering is often defined as making practical application of theoretical sciences such as physics and mathematics. Many of the early branches of engineering were based not on science but on empirical information that depended on observation and experience.

The great engineering works of ancient times were constructed and operated largely by means of slave labor. During the Middle Ages people
began to seek devices and methods of work that were more efficient and humane. Wind, water, and animals were used to provide energy for some of these new devices. This led to the Industrial Revolution that began in the eighteenth century. First steam engines and then other kinds of machines took over more and more of the work that had previously been done by human beings or by animals. James Watt, one of the key figures in the early development of steam engines, devised the concept of horsepower to make his customers understand the amount of work his machines could perform.

Since the nineteenth century both scientific research and practical application of its results have escalated. The mechanical engineer now has the mathematical ability to calculate the mechanical advantage that results from the complex interaction of many different mechanisms. He or she also has new and stronger materials to work with and enormous new sources of power. The Industrial Revolution began by putting water and steam to work; since then machines using electricity, gasoline, and other energy sources have become so widespread that they now do a very large proportion of the work of the world.

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