B. LET'S COMPREHEND:
B.1. THINK AND TELL:
B.1.1 Answer these questions orally:
Q. 1. What things in the first stanza tell you that the poet is curious?
Ans. Asking questions about the green colour of grass, unseen wind. building a nest by a bird and the rest of trees tell me that the poet is curious.
Q. 2. Why do you think the speaker calls the cloud fluffy?
Ans. The clouds are flying very easily and smoothly, so they seem fluffy to the speaker.
Q. 3. Does the wind have any colour?
Ans. No, the wind does not have any colour.
Q. 4. Do you often ask your father about the things that you wonder at ? Does he answer your questions? If he doesn't, what do you do to satisfy your curiosity ?
Ans. Yes, I often ask questions to my father about the things that I wonder at. He, sometimes, answers me and sometimes not. When he does not answer me I imagine some answer or ask some other persons.
B.1.2. Based on your reading of the poem say whether the following statements are 'true' or 'false'.
(a) The shape of moon is fixed.
(b). The birds make their own nests.
(c) The rainbow is not always colourful.
(d) The stars do not give light.
Ans. (a) False. (b) True. (c) False, (d) False.
B.2. THINK AND WRITE :
B.2.1. Think of things and ideas that you associate with rain. Then create a web chart around the word 'rain'..
Ans.
B.2.2. Answer the following questions in not more than 50 words.
Q. 1. Make a list of things that the poet is curious to know about.
Ans. The poet is curious to know about : reason of greenness of grass, invisibility of wind, teacher of bird to build nest, instructor of trees, who commanded them to take rest, place of missing bit of moon, the person who lights the stars, makes lightning flash, paints rainbow and hangs the fluffy clouds so high.
Q. 2. Who do you think is the 'I' in the poem—a child or an adult ? Give reasons for your answer.
Ans. The 'I' in the poem is used for a child. Reasion: The questions raised by the inquirer is childish.
Q. 3. What opinion do you form about the speaker ?
Ans. In my opinion, the speaker is a child. It seems that the poet himself feels all the questions in his mind in childhood. Now, he composes these ideas for people to experience the peculiarity of nature.
Q. 4. What does the question in the end suggest about the speaker's attitude towards his dad ?
Ans. The speaker thinks that his dad won't answer his questions, if he knows, because he (dad) thinks that the answers to these questions are not understandable to a child.
C. WORD STUDY
C.1. Phrasal Verb:
C.1.1. What does the phrasal verb 'blow out' mean in the poem ? Look up a dictionary and list the meaning. Note down other meanings of the phrasal verb and use it in your own sentences conveying other meanings.
Ans. In the poem the phrasal verb 'blow out' means 'extinguish’. The other meanings are to burst, to fuse, to send forcibly. Use in sentences : to burst-The tyre of the car blew out suddenly. to fuse-The electric bulb blew out. to send forcibly-The window was blown out due to the explosion.
C.1.2. Look up a dictionary and list other phrasal verbs that begin with 'blow', and use them in your own sentences.
Ans. Blow away -The sun reyolves round the earth'-This theory is blown away today.
Blow in- The boy has blown in from his school casually.
Blow over- The quarrel between the villagers blew over.
Blow through- The thief blew through the place shorty.
Blow up -The army man was blown up in anger.
C.1.3. Fill in the blanks in the sentences given below with the suitable phrasal verbs given in the box.
(1. put out; to extinguish, 2. call out to summon, 3. set out to begin a journey, 4. wipe out to remove, 5. give up to leave )
(a) The government is ready to .............. Polio.
(b) He ............. for Kolakata with his father.
(c)............. a doctor to examine the patient.
(d) He had to ............. smoking because he had breathing problems.
(e) ............... the lantern.
Ans. (a) wipe out , (b) set out, (c) call out, (d) give up, (e) put outPolio.
D. RHYME TIME :
Look at the following pairs of words:
green-seen, nest-rest
These pairs of words, you will notice, end with similar sounds. Such pairs of words that end with a similar sound are called rhyming pairs or words.
Q. Pick out the rhyming pairs from the poem and add one more to each pair. One has been done for you.
green - seen - been
Ans. nest - rest - best
round - found - sound
out - about - shout
sky - high - thy
suppose - knows - blows
E. LET'S TALK:
Q. Discuss the following in groups or pairs and imagine : If the moon did not appear in the sky, what would happen?
Ans. Rohit : What would happen if the moon did not appear in the sky.
Sonu : It would be only dark nights always.
Rohit : I imagine, if moon did not appear, there would not be coldness at night.
Sonu : It seems to me that without moon, nights would be very cold.
Rohit : All right, let it remain the same as it is.
F. TRANSLATION :
Translate into your mother tongue any one of the stanzas of the poem that you have just read.
(Hint: See the meaning of the poem on page 6.)
SOME OTHER IMPORTANT QUESTIONS WITH ANSWERS
Q. 1. Can you say how the stars blow out and how they burns ?
Ans. Yes, the stars are always burning. They never blow out, but during the day time they do not come to our vision due to the brighter light of the sun. When the sun sets, they come to our vision in darkness of nights.
Q. 2. Who taught the birds to build nests ?
Ans. It is the nature who has given them mind to think and apply it for their necessity.
Q. 3. Why the grass is green and the wind is never seen ?
Ans. The grass is green due to chlorophyll present in its body. The wind is not seen because it has no colour and structure.
Q. 4. How does a rainbow appear in the sky and when ?
Ans. A rainbow appears in the sky during rain. When the hanging drops of water act like a prism it forms a rainbow from the rays of sun in the opposite direction.
