Q1.
Write the poem Papa’s Spectacles in the form of a story in your notebook. Share your story with the class. You may start like this.
Today, my father is unhappy ...
Answer
How to turn a poem into a story:
- Follow the same order of events as the poem — he loses them, he cannot work, he searches, the child finds them.
- Write in sentences and paragraphs, not in lines and stanzas.
- Add small details the poem leaves out — the time of day, how Papa looked, what he said.
- Keep one tense all the way through. The book suggests the present tense, so start “Today, my father is unhappy …” and stay there.
- Use joining words — first, then, after that, at last, finally.
- End with the surprise, because that is where the fun is.
Sample answer (present tense, as the book suggests):
Papa’s Spectacles
Today, my father is unhappy. He is searching everywhere in the house. He has lost his spectacles, and they are his only pair. He has no second pair to wear.
Without his spectacles he cannot do anything. He cannot read the newspaper, though it is lying open on the table. He cannot watch TV, because the picture looks blurred to him. He cannot even cut the vegetables for lunch, because he cannot see the knife properly. “Oh! Where can it be?” he keeps saying.
So the hunt begins. First he checks inside all his pockets, one by one. Then he bends down and glances under his chair. After that he searches near the window, where he sat reading in the morning. He looks everywhere — on the shelf, beside the bed, under the newspaper — but the spectacles are nowhere.
I am watching him from the doorway. Suddenly I begin to smile, because I can see something he cannot. I call out, “Stop, Papa!” He stops and turns. I go up close to him and say, “Papa, your spectacles are right there on your head!”
He puts his hand up, and there they are. He laughs out loud, and so do I. The spectacles were never lost at all. They were sitting on his head the whole time.
Today, my father is unhappy. He is searching everywhere in the house. He has lost his spectacles, and they are his only pair. He has no second pair to wear.
Without his spectacles he cannot do anything. He cannot read the newspaper, though it is lying open on the table. He cannot watch TV, because the picture looks blurred to him. He cannot even cut the vegetables for lunch, because he cannot see the knife properly. “Oh! Where can it be?” he keeps saying.
So the hunt begins. First he checks inside all his pockets, one by one. Then he bends down and glances under his chair. After that he searches near the window, where he sat reading in the morning. He looks everywhere — on the shelf, beside the bed, under the newspaper — but the spectacles are nowhere.
I am watching him from the doorway. Suddenly I begin to smile, because I can see something he cannot. I call out, “Stop, Papa!” He stops and turns. I go up close to him and say, “Papa, your spectacles are right there on your head!”
He puts his hand up, and there they are. He laughs out loud, and so do I. The spectacles were never lost at all. They were sitting on his head the whole time.
If you want to write in the past tense — the Note to the Teacher allows this — begin like this: “One day my father lost his spectacles …” and change every verb: is becomes was, checks becomes checked, says becomes said. Do not mix the two tenses in one story.
What a good story must have: a beginning that tells us the problem, a middle that shows the search step by step, and an end that gives the surprise. If any one of these is missing, the story feels incomplete.