NCERT Solutions for Class 5th English Chapter 5 B. Think and discuss — Let us Think

This is a “put yourself in its place” question. There is no single right answer. Think about what would be fun and what would be hard, and say both.

Sample answer: Living like a frog would feel free and a little frightening at the same time. The best part would be having two homes. When the day is hot I could slip into the cool pond, and when I wanted to look around I could climb out on to a rock. I would never have to wait for a bus, because my back legs would carry me a long way in one leap. Rain would be the happiest weather of all, not a reason to run indoors.

But it would also be hard. My skin would always have to stay damp, so I could never go far from water. I would have to keep very still and watch all the time, because a snake could be near. And I would have to catch every meal myself with my tongue — there would be no one to cook for me. I think I would enjoy the swimming and the leaping most, and I would find the waiting and the watching the hardest.

This one is about your own imagination. Answer with three or four things you would really do, and say why each would be fun.

Sample answer: If I could hop as high as a frog, I would first jump up and pluck the mangoes from the very top of our neighbour’s tree, where nobody can reach. In our cricket match I would leap up and catch every ball that was going over the boundary, so my team would never lose a catch. I would hop straight over the puddles on the road in the rains instead of walking around them, and I would reach school in about ten jumps. On Diwali I would hop up and hang the lamps along the top of the wall without needing a ladder. Best of all, I would jump high enough to see over everyone’s heads in a crowded fair.

The biggest difference is this: a fish lives in water all its life, but a frog lives its early life in water and then moves out on to the land as well.

The poem itself gives the clue. The frog says, “As a tadpole, I swim with cheer, / A tiny fish-like thing, so clear!” So a frog begins life looking and living like a small fish. But then it changes. Later it says, “I live on land and water too.” A fish never gets to say that.

How a frog grows up:

1. Eggs. The mother frog lays hundreds of tiny eggs in the pond. They float together in a soft jelly.
2. Tadpole. Out of each egg comes a tadpole — a round head with a long tail, and no legs at all. It breathes under water through gills, which are the feathery parts on the side of its head. This is the “tiny fish-like thing” of the poem.
3. Back legs first. Two back legs grow. The tail is still there and still does the swimming.
4. Froglet. The two front legs come out. The tail slowly grows smaller and smaller. Lungs grow inside, so the little frog starts coming up to gulp air.
5. Frog. The tail is gone. Four legs, webbed back feet, lungs for air — and now it can climb out and sit on the bank.

Sample answer: A frog’s life changes twice over, but a fish’s life does not. A frog begins as an egg in the pond and then becomes a tadpole, which has a tail and gills and swims exactly like a small fish. After some weeks its legs grow, its tail disappears, and it can hop out on to the land. A fish is born a fish and stays a fish. It has fins and scales, it breathes through gills all its life, and it can never leave the water. So the frog gets two worlds and the fish gets one — but the fish is a far better swimmer, because it does nothing else.

Both are wide and flat, and both work in the same way: they push a lot of water backwards, so the swimmer shoots forwards.

Flippers are the long, flat rubber shoes a diver straps on to his feet. A scuba diver is a person who swims deep under water carrying a tank of air on his back.

Sample answer: A frog’s webbed feet and a diver’s flippers are alike because both make the foot wide and flat. When the frog kicks, the skin between its toes pushes a large amount of water backwards and the frog glides forward. When the diver kicks, the rubber flipper does exactly the same thing. In fact people made flippers after watching animals such as frogs and ducks swim. The only difference is that the frog is born with its webbed feet, while the diver has to buy his flippers and strap them on.