English · Chapter 31
Study notes aligned to the official NEB syllabus.
Money and Economy is a theme-based Language Development unit in the NEB Grade 12 Compulsory English textbook. It follows the standard pattern of the section: a reading text with comprehension exercises, vocabulary work on theme words, a grammar focus, a listening or speaking activity and a writing task. The theme connects language study to everyday economic life, from saving and spending to the digital payments that have spread rapidly in Nepal. The reading text is about the QR code, the small square pattern now found on shop counters, bills and tickets, and it links a piece of technology to the way money moves in a modern economy.
The reading text describes the QR code, its invention and its uses. QR stands for Quick Response. The code was invented in Japan in 1994 by a company in the automotive industry, which needed a better way to track parts and components in its factories. Ordinary barcodes, the striped codes printed on packaged goods, could hold only a small amount of information and had to be scanned one at a time from the correct side. The engineers wanted a code that could hold far more data and could be read quickly, in any direction, by a simple scanner.
The solution was a two-dimensional code. A traditional barcode stores information in one direction only, in the widths and spacing of its vertical lines. A QR code stores information both horizontally and vertically, in the pattern of small black and white squares called modules. Because it uses two dimensions, it can hold hundreds of times more information than a barcode of the same size: numbers, letters, website addresses, Japanese characters and other kinds of data. The three large squares in the corners of every QR code are position markers. They let the scanner find the code and work out its orientation instantly, which is why the code can be read from any angle and at high speed. The code also contains error correction, so it can still be read when part of it is dirty, torn or covered by a logo.
The reading then follows the QR code out of the factory and into daily life. For years it was used mainly in manufacturing and logistics to track products. As mobile phones with cameras became common, the QR code found a new purpose. A phone camera can read the code and open a website, save a contact, connect to a Wi-Fi network, show a restaurant menu, check in for a flight or verify a ticket. The most important use for the theme of this unit is payment. A customer scans the code displayed by a shopkeeper, enters the amount and confirms, and money moves from one digital wallet or bank account to another in seconds without cash, cards or change. In Nepal, QR payments through mobile wallets and banking apps are now common even in small shops and taxis.
The text closes on the wider point that a simple invention meant to solve a factory problem has changed how people shop, travel and pay, and has made a largely cashless daily life possible. Comprehension questions test the reason for the invention, the difference between barcodes and QR codes, the function of the corner squares and the uses of the code today.