IELTS Reading Practice: Museums and Technology
IELTS · ReadingA passage on digital displays and online collections, with True / False / Not Given questions.
1Read the text
Museums have traditionally been places where visitors look at objects behind glass and read short labels. Over the last two decades, many have added digital technology, from touch screens and audio guides to online collections that anyone can search from home. Some curators welcome these changes as a way to reach new audiences. Others worry that screens may distract visitors from the objects themselves.
Digitising a collection has clear practical benefits. A museum may own far more objects than it can display, and photographing and cataloguing the rest allows researchers and students to study them without travelling. Digital copies can also act as a record if an object is damaged. Creating them is slow and costly, however, and a small museum may lack the staff to do it.
Interactive displays aim to make visits more engaging, especially for children. Visitors can, for example, rebuild a broken pot on a screen or see how an ancient city looked when it was complete. Studies of visitor behaviour suggest that people tend to spend longer at exhibits with an interactive element. Whether they learn more as a result is less clear, because it is harder to measure.
There is also a debate about authenticity. Many visitors still say that the strongest experience is standing in front of a real object that is hundreds or thousands of years old. For this reason, several museums use technology to add context rather than to replace the objects, and they keep the digital material separate from the main galleries.
2True, false or not given Tap an answer. You see why straight away.
1. Some curators are concerned that screens may take attention away from the objects.
2. A museum usually displays every object that it owns.
3. Visitors tend to spend longer at exhibits that have an interactive element.
4. It is easy to measure how much visitors learn from interactive displays.
5. Children enjoy interactive displays more than adults do.
6. Online museum collections attract more visitors than the museums themselves.
Done. Your first lesson is on its way.
Answer key — IELTS Reading Practice: Museums and Technology
- TRUE — The passage says others worry that "screens may distract visitors from the objects themselves."
- FALSE — The passage says a museum "may own far more objects than it can display."
- TRUE — The passage says "people tend to spend longer at exhibits with an interactive element."
- FALSE — The passage says whether they learn more is less clear because it is "harder to measure."
- NOT GIVEN — The passage says displays aim to engage visitors "especially for children", but it does not say who enjoys them more.
- NOT GIVEN — The passage mentions online collections but gives no visitor numbers.