Time zones and the date line
Tests: 3 of 11 right · Exam: 1 of 4 right · Kind: ★★ · Understood: 6 of 15 · Run: 2026-10-18, commit f3c23ea72
Lesson 4 of the geography course of Mova's primary school, as Mova's small model took its tests: it had read this lesson and the ones before it and learned from their exercises. Each test shows the options in the order the student saw them, its choice, the right answer, the score of every option and why it chose. The lesson itself, sentence by sentence with trees and pragmatics: the lesson in the corpora.
Every question of this lesson and each of its options parsed by Mova, with trees and pragmatics: the lesson's questions in the corpora.
Test 1 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Local noon in two places is 3 hours apart. How far apart are they in longitude?
- 1. 15 degrees — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. 45 degrees — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 3. 90 degrees — no support
- 4. 3 degrees — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 2 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Why did trains, not ships or horses, force countries to share one clock time?
- 1. Trains ran only at noon — no support
- 2. Trains were fast and needed one timetable for all stations — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 3. Ships always used London time — ← Mova's choice · score 2
- 4. Horses could not tell the time — score 2
Why: It took the question to ask why something happens (its cause). It chose option 3 with score 2, tied with another option at 2 (the first shown, or the one claiming less beyond what it knows, wins). Its support: lesson 4, line 2: «In 1337, when EU5 starts, every town simply kept its own sun time, and nobody minded because no horse or ship was fast enough for a few minutes to matter.», reached through the cause of the sentence the question matched. What matched: the same doer «horse» (+4). Against it: a different action (counts against) (-2). The right option, 2, found no support in what it remembers. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 3 · ★★ · right ✓
footy starts 7pm in New York, mate in LA wants to watch live. What time for him?
- 1. 4pm — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · no support
- 2. 1pm — no support
- 3. 7pm — no support
- 4. 10pm — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 4 · ★★ · wrong ✗
What is strange about sunrise in western China?
- 1. The Sun rises in the west there — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. There is no sunrise in winter — no support
- 3. It comes before midnight — no support
- 4. It comes very late by the clock, because of the single zone — ✓ the right answer · no support
Why: Nothing it remembers matched the question, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 5 · ★★ · right ✓
If you sailed around the world eastwards, would you gain or lose a day on your log?
- 1. You would lose a week — no support
- 2. Your log would be a day ahead — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 5
- 3. Nothing would change — no support
- 4. Your log would be a day behind — score 5
Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 2 with score 5, tied with another option at 5 (the first shown, or the one claiming less beyond what it knows, wins). Its support: lesson 4, line 15: «When the survivors of Magellan's expedition, led home by Juan Sebastián Elcano, returned to Spain in 1522, they found their log was one day behind the date on…», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same doer «log» (+2); the same thing acted on «one day» (+2); the same light verb (be, have, do, get, go) (+1). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 6 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Why would trade with Australia matter more to Samoa by 2011?
- 1. Being a day behind left only four shared working days a week — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 2. Australia owned Samoa — no support
- 3. The United States closed its ports — no support
- 4. Samoa wanted New Year to come later — ← Mova's choice · score 0
Why: It took the question to ask why something happens (its cause). It chose option 4 with score 0, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 4, line 14: «Samoa jumped to the west side of the date line by skipping Friday 30 December 2011 entirely, so it now has the same date as its big trading partners Australia…», reached through the cause of the sentence the question matched. What matched: the same doer «samoa» (+4). Against it: a different action (counts against) (-2); a different thing acted on (counts against) (-2). The right option, 1, found no support in what it remembers. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 7 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Why do countries close to the equator not need daylight saving time?
- 1. They have no clocks — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. It is always night there in the winter months — no support
- 3. Day length hardly changes there through the year — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 4. The Sun never sets at the equator — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 8 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Why does France have more time zones than Russia, which is much bigger?
- 1. Its overseas lands are spread round the globe — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 2. Russia uses only one zone — ← Mova's choice · score 3
- 3. Paris uses several clocks — no support
- 4. France is wider than Russia — no support
Why: It took the question to ask why something happens (its cause). It chose option 2 with score 3, the only option with support. Its support: lesson 4, line 17: «France uses 12 time zones, more than any other country, if its overseas territories are counted.», reached through the option's own match among the sentences about the question's things. What matched: the same action «use» (+2); the same thing acted on «12 time zones» (+2). Against it: a different doer (counts against) (-1). The right option, 1, found no support in what it remembers. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 9 · ★★ · wrong ✗
Kid says "the date line is straight cos it's just 180 degrees". Right?
- 1. No, it zigzags round island groups — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 2. No, it runs through London — score 4
- 3. Yes, it is perfectly straight from pole to pole — ← Mova's choice · score 8
- 4. Yes, nobody lives near it — no support
Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 3 with score 8, against 4 for the next best. Its support: lesson 3, line 7: «Gerardus Mercator published his famous world map in 1569, and on it a straight line is a line of constant compass bearing.», reached through the remembered sentence the question matched. What matched: the same doer «straight line» (+4); the same property (+2); the same light verb (be, have, do, get, go) (+2). The right option, 1, found no support in what it remembers. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 10 · ★★ · wrong ✗
In EU5 your army marches from Lisbon to Moscow. Why would no real general of 1500 have worried about time zones?
- 1. Armies carried UTC clocks — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. Every town used its own sun time and travel was slow — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 3. Time zones were secret — no support
- 4. Lisbon and Moscow had the same sun time — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Test 11 · ★★ · right ✓
Bristol is west of London. Does local noon come before or after London's?
- 1. After, about 10 minutes later — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · no support
- 2. Before, about 10 minutes earlier — no support
- 3. One hour later — no support
- 4. At exactly the same moment — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Exam question 1 · formal language · wrong ✗
Ascertain the angular rotation of the Earth, expressed in degrees of longitude, accomplished in the course of one hour.
- 1. Thirty degrees of longitude — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. Twenty-four degrees — no support
- 3. One degree of longitude — no support
- 4. Fifteen degrees — ✓ the right answer · no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Exam question 2 · formal language · wrong ✗
Whereas a traveller traverses the International Date Line in a westerly direction, determine the consequent alteration to the calendar date.
- 1. It remains unaltered — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. It recedes by one day — no support
- 3. It advances by one day — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 4. It advances by one week — no support
Why: No option found support in what it remembers, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Exam question 3 · formal language · right ✓
Identify the principal reason for which a uniform national time was adopted by the British railways.
- 1. The Sun no longer kept regular time — score 2
- 2. Local solar time had been abolished by Parliament — no support
- 3. Railway timetables required a single common time — ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer · score 4
- 4. Ships required it for navigation — no support
Why: It took the question to ask which statement is true. It chose option 3 with score 4, against 2 for the next best. Its support: lesson 4, line 3: «Trains changed that: a timetable needs one clock, so British railways took London time in the 1840s, and the world later split into time zones counted from UTC.», reached through a sentence linked to the one the question matched. What matched: the same action «need» (+2); the same doer «timetable» (+2). · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
Exam question 4 · formal language · wrong ✗
Select the response consistent with the established facts concerning the Republic of India's standard time.
- 1. It is identical to UTC — ← Mova's choice · no support
- 2. It is eight hours ahead of UTC — no support
- 3. It is five hours and thirty minutes ahead of UTC — ✓ the right answer · no support
- 4. It is five hours ahead of UTC — no support
Why: Nothing it remembers matched the question, so it guessed: it took the first option shown. · the question and its options parsed, with trees and pragmatics
This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/geography/4-time-zones-and-the-date-line/