NCERT Solutions for Class 5th English Chapter 3 The Rainbow
Updated on 2026-09-19
About this chapter
Stanza 1 — three things that sail. “Boats sail on the rivers, / And ships sail on the seas; / But clouds that sail across the sky / Are prettier far than these.” The poet lines up three sailing things. Boats sail on rivers. Ships sail on seas. Clouds sail across the sky. Then she says the clouds are the prettiest of the three. Notice the word sail — it is used for the clouds too, as if the sky were a sea. Stanza 2 — three things that bridge. “There are bridges on the rivers, / As pretty as you please; / But the bow that bridges heaven, / And overtops the trees, / And builds a road from earth to sky, / Is prettier far than these.” Now the poet lines up bridges. A bridge on a river is pretty. But the rainbow is a bridge too — a bridge across the sky. It is much prettier. What the poem means.
- The Rainbow
- A. Answer the following
- B. Think and discuss
- A. Rearrange the letters to form a word from the poem
- B. The spinning circle
- Give five rhyming words for each word
- Recite two poems in three different voices
- A. Share and write about a journey
- B. A word joins a ‘friend word’ to make a new word
- C. Words that are both nouns and verbs
Quick revision
| Word | What it means | The line it appears in | A sentence of your own |
|---|---|---|---|
| bow | Anything bent into a curve. Here it means the rainbow — a bow of colours across the sky. | “But the bow that bridges heaven,” | The rainbow made a coloured bow over our field. |
| bridges | Here it is a verb. To bridge means to join two places, the way a bridge does. | “But the bow that bridges heaven,” | A plank of wood bridges the drain outside our gate. |
| overtops | Rises higher than something; goes above the top of it. | “And overtops the trees,” | The temple tower overtops every house in our village. |
| sail | To move smoothly across water — or, in a poem, across the sky. | “Boats sail on the rivers,” | Little paper boats sail on the puddle after rain. |
| prettier | More beautiful. Prettier far means very much more beautiful. | “Are prettier far than these.” | This rangoli is prettier than the one we made last year. |
| heaven | The sky. In old poems the sky is often called heaven. | “the bow that bridges heaven” | At night the stars fill the whole heaven. |
| as you please | As much as you like. “As pretty as you please” means very pretty indeed. | “As pretty as you please;” | The garden was as green as you please after the rain. |
| rainbow | A curved band of seven colours in the sky, made when sunlight passes through raindrops. | Title of the poem | We saw a rainbow over the hills after the shower. |
| VIBGYOR | A made-up word for remembering the rainbow’s seven colours in order: Violet, Indigo, Blue, Green, Yellow, Orange, Red. | Let us Write, E | I learnt VIBGYOR in one minute. |
| anagram | A word whose letters have been jumbled up. Put them back in order to find the real word. | Let us Learn, A — sial becomes sail | Tacs is an anagram of cats. |
| compound word | One word made by joining two smaller words. | Let us Write, B — rain + bow = rainbow | Football is a compound word. |
| noun / verb | A noun is a naming word. A verb is a doing word. Some words can be both. | Let us Write, C — “a bridge of roots” / “to bridge the stream” | I use a comb (noun) to comb (verb) my hair. |
| rhyming words | Words that end in the same sound, like seas and these. | Let us Listen | Ship, chip and trip are rhyming words. |
| opposite | A word that means the other end of an idea — the opposite of large is small. | Let us Write, D | The opposite of rough is smooth. |
Exercises
- The Rainbow — Let us Recite Page 27
- A. Answer the following — Let us Think Page 28
- B. Think and discuss — Let us Think Page 28
- A. Rearrange the letters to form a word from the poem — Let us Learn Page 29
- B. The spinning circle — Let us Learn Page 29
- Give five rhyming words for each word — Let us Listen Page 30
- Recite two poems in three different voices — Let us Speak Page 31–32
- A. Share and write about a journey — Let us Write Page 33
- B. A word joins a ‘friend word’ to make a new word — Let us Write Page 34
- C. Words that are both nouns and verbs — Let us Write Page 35
- D. Opposites that all begin with ‘S’ — Let us Write Page 36
- E. VIBGYOR — Let us Write Page 37
- F. The colours of things in the kitchen — Let us Write Page 37
- G. Design and colour a Flowerpot Friend — Let us Write Page 38
- Colour combinations — Let us Do Page 39
- A. Types of boats · B. Human-made and natural things — Let us Explore Page 40