Questões para Concursos

Underground library in Warsaw metro invites commuters to trade scrolling for stories

In Warsaw’s Targówek district, a metro ride has become more than a daily routine. Now it offers a chance to escape into a story. Thanks to Metroteka, a newly opened subterranean library inside the Kondratowicza M2 metro station, commuters can now trade mindless scrolling for meaningful reading.
The 150-square-meter space is stocked with more than 16,000 books, all available through a fast self-checkout system. Visitors can also borrow laptops, sip complimentary coffee, and unwind in a cozy communal area, all while waiting for their train.
“Our dream is for Metroteka to become an educational and cultural center, and not just a place where you can borrow your books from,” says Grażyna StrzelczakBatkowska, deputy director of the Targówek library.

A modern space that breathes life into books
Metroteka’s design is as inviting as its mission. A lush hydroponic garden wall filled with herbs and flowers gives the underground space a breath of fresh air, literally. Basil, oregano, and other plants grow without soil or sunlight, infusing the library with an unexpected sense of vitality. The bookshelves, shaped like soft, undulating waves, add to the organic feel.
“I always joke that books are not made of glass,” Strzelczak-Batkowska says. “You can just pop in, grab a few, throw them on a self-checkout machine, and that’s it—you’re out on a new adventure.”

Aiming to reverse a national trend
Poland’s reading habits have been in steady decline for years. A 2024 survey by the National Library of Poland found that only 41 percent of respondents had read at least one book in the past year. According to Tomasz Makowski, director of the National Library, the legacy of war has shaped these numbers. During World War II, Poland lost 70 percent of its libraries.
“We had several generations that did not see their parents or grandparents in front of a wall of books,” Makowski says. “Reading is [also] not something associated with adulthood, but with schools, teachers, librarians, and usually mothers reading to children.
By placing literature in the path of everyday commuters, Metroteka hopes to shift that cultural perception.

An open invitation to all
For Makowski, the location is just as important as the books. “Opening a library in a metro station is like a dream for us,” he says. “Libraries should be beautiful and open; inviting, not intimidating. It’s not a shrine, but a place where you can spend time freely, take part in discussions, public consultations, or meet people.”
In the coming months, Metroteka plans to host author readings, workshops, and classes to further engage the community. Books can be returned either directly to the library or via parcel lockers outside the station, available around the clock.
As commuters pass through Kondratowicza station with coffee in hand and a novel tucked under one arm, Metroteka quietly transforms daily routines into cultural moments. By meeting people where they are, literally underground, the library isn’t just promoting reading. It’s redefining what public space can offer.

Source: https://www.optimistdaily.com/2025/09/underground-library-in-warsaw-metro-invites-commuters-to-trade-scrolling-for-stories/. Access on May 4th 2026.

Use the following text to answer questions 16 to 21.

The case for foreign languages as an aspiring lawyer

If you want to work in the competitive legal profession, having foreign language skills can help to set you apart.

The relative lack of foreign language skills among the UK population is well-documented. A recent Guardian survey revealed that 39% of young native English speakers were put off learning a foreign language because “most people speak English”, and 14% by the idea that “most other languages are not useful”. But for students hoping to enter the legal profession – which is increasingly global in outlook – being able to speak a foreign language is useful, and ever more desirable to employers. In other words, students who speak more than one language are increasingly valued by employers. The globalisation of legal practice means that many international law firms will not hire lawyers without language skills, said Patricio Grané Labat, partner of public international law firm Volterra Fietta. “In our profession, language skills are critical because, as international lawyers, we apply our trade with words. It is certainly something I look for when I recruit. If a candidate is not fluent in other languages, I generally will not consider them – if I do, it’s usually for a discrete assignment,” he said.
Dr. Martina Künnecke, lecturer at the University of Hull, added: “Students need a global mindset, and language skills are a part of that. It’s absolutely crucial considering the competition in the jobs market today.” She encourages students to learn a new language in their spare time and to take up opportunities to study law abroad.
Knowing at least one foreign language can also enable you to broaden the scope of your work, said Gabriel Helou, legal officer at the Norwegian Refugee Council and former project manager in the rule of law and justice sector at the EU delegation in Jerusalem.
“It enables legal professionals to explore foreign legal systems or experiences through a comparative approach. Referring to the original sources of information can sometimes be more reliable and comprehensible,” said Gabriel Helou. According to him, foreign language skills give lawyers a global mindset which is increasingly useful and desired by employers – so it might be worth dusting off those old textbooks.

Adapted from: SUTCLIFFE, Matthew. The case for foreign languages as an aspiring lawyer. The Guardian, London, Aug. 19, 2014. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/law/2014/aug/19/foreign-language-skills-law-career. Accessed on: Apr. 27, 2025.

Use the following text to answer questions 16 to 21.

The case for foreign languages as an aspiring lawyer

If you want to work in the competitive legal profession, having foreign language skills can help to set you apart.

The relative lack of foreign language skills among the UK population is well-documented. A recent Guardian survey revealed that 39% of young native English speakers were put off learning a foreign language because “most people speak English”, and 14% by the idea that “most other languages are not useful”. But for students hoping to enter the legal profession – which is increasingly global in outlook – being able to speak a foreign language is useful, and ever more desirable to employers. In other words, students who speak more than one language are increasingly valued by employers. The globalisation of legal practice means that many international law firms will not hire lawyers without language skills, said Patricio Grané Labat, partner of public international law firm Volterra Fietta. “In our profession, language skills are critical because, as international lawyers, we apply our trade with words. It is certainly something I look for when I recruit. If a candidate is not fluent in other languages, I generally will not consider them – if I do, it’s usually for a discrete assignment,” he said.
Dr. Martina Künnecke, lecturer at the University of Hull, added: “Students need a global mindset, and language skills are a part of that. It’s absolutely crucial considering the competition in the jobs market today.” She encourages students to learn a new language in their spare time and to take up opportunities to study law abroad.
Knowing at least one foreign language can also enable you to broaden the scope of your work, said Gabriel Helou, legal officer at the Norwegian Refugee Council and former project manager in the rule of law and justice sector at the EU delegation in Jerusalem.
“It enables legal professionals to explore foreign legal systems or experiences through a comparative approach. Referring to the original sources of information can sometimes be more reliable and comprehensible,” said Gabriel Helou. According to him, foreign language skills give lawyers a global mindset which is increasingly useful and desired by employers – so it might be worth dusting off those old textbooks.

Adapted from: SUTCLIFFE, Matthew. The case for foreign languages as an aspiring lawyer. The Guardian, London, Aug. 19, 2014. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/law/2014/aug/19/foreign-language-skills-law-career. Accessed on: Apr. 27, 2025.

Text 2A7

Artificial intelligence (AI) is arguably the most rapidly advancing technology humans have ever developed. A year ago, you wouldn’t often hear AI come up in a regular conversation, but today it seems there’s constant talk about how generative AI tools like ChatGPT and DALL-E will affect the future of work, the spread of information, and more. A major question that has thus far been almost entirely unexamined is how this AI-dominated future will affect people’s minds.
There’s been some research into how using AI in their jobs will affect people mentally, but there isn’t yet an understanding of how simply living amongst so much AI-generated content and systems will affect people’s sense of the world. How is AI going to change individuals and society in the not-too-distant future?
AI will obviously make it easier to produce disinformation. That will affect people’s sense of trust as they’re scrolling on social media. AI can also allow someone to imitate your loved ones, which further erodes people’s general ability to trust what was once unquestionable.

Internet: (adapted).

1 In Hollywood, a typical medium-sized town in the
American state of Florida, the Police Department (PD)
values the development of its community’s youth. The
4 agency recognizes the importance of raising young people
to become upstanding, law-abiding citizens. The town
serves as home to over 20,000 youth, some of whom live
7 in underprivileged areas and need positive role models.
Officers identified this hardship and began making
a difference in many kids’ lives when the department
10 established its Cops Mentoring Kids program during the
2015-2016 academic year. This initiative connects police
officers who serve as mentors with at-risk students in local
13 schools.
Mentoring provides an avenue to change future
generations’ mind-sets. Countering and preventing
16 recruitment efforts by criminal organizations should
concern everyone. Adolescents trying to find their place in
the world become most vulnerable to enticement by these
19 groups. Building young people’s self-esteem and values
provides resilience against criminal predators’
misguidance.

Internet: < https://leb.fbi.gov> (adapted).

Based on the text presented above, judge the following items.

In the old days, we didn’t much write like talking because there was no mechanism to reproduce the speed of conversation. But texting and instant messaging do — and a revolution has begun. It involves the brute mechanics of writing, but in its economy, spontaneity and even vulgarity, texting is actually a new kind of talking. There is a virtual cult of concision and little interest in capitalization or punctuation. The argument that texting is “poor writing” is analogous, then, to one that the Rolling Stones is “bad music” because it doesn’t use violas. Texting is developing its own kind of grammar and conventions.

Internet: .
Based on the previous text, judge the following items.

Whatever training is given there should always be a permanent concern about the naturalness and spontaneity of everyday speech rather than an artificial sound production for the sake of preserving a “correct” pronunciation.
This is, in fact, a crucial issue, since if too much care is demanded from the student, this may turn out to be an undesirable blockage to another more important factor, namely, fluency. Perhaps, and even worse, if over-careful pronunciation habits are developed, this will certainly cause difficulties for the oral comprehension, as the students will expect to hear sounds, words and utterances the way they personally produce them.

G.A. Chauvet. Improve Your Pronunciation . Brasília:
Editora Universidade de Brasília, 2005 (adapted).

Based on the previous text, judge the following items.

Internet: (adapted).

Based on the comic strip above, judge the following items.

Text 3A1-II

There is ample evidence that reading not only strengthens second language vocabulary, but also expands it as readers meet words, or the same word, in different contexts. After all, that is the way lexical vocabulary is acquired in real life, through hearing it in our first languages.
Apart from learning vocabulary, learners also learn new structures, which can form a strong scaffolding both for learning other new structures and introducing grammatical items to a class.
In listening to each other read, discuss points in groups, debate, or answer and their rationale, second language learners will sharpen both listening and speaking skills.
There is no magic bullet, no single explanation for what teachers can do to ensure that their students learn to read a second or foreign language. Practice and plenty of it may be the only way out.

J. Kembo. Using short texts to teach English as second language. Rongo University, Kenya. Universal Journal of Educational Research 4(12): 2735-2743, 2016 (adapted).