NCERT Solutions for Class 6th English Chapter 3 What a Bird Thought — Let us do these activities before we read
Book page 85 Updated on2026-09-19
Q1.
Look at the picture and discuss what you see in the picture with your teacher and classmates. Think of a time when you worked hard. What did you do then? • How did it help you? • How did it make you feel? Also, discuss in groups.
The picture on page 85, redrawn.
Answer
The picture (page 85): a tall green tree. High up on one branch there is a nest with three open-mouthed chicks in it, and a red parent bird flying in to them with its wings spread. A little lower, a green parrot is clinging to the trunk. So the picture shows the same three stages the poem will show — the nest, the young bird, and the free flier.
Then talk about your own hard work in three steps: what you did, how it helped, how it felt.
Sample answer: Last year I could not swim at all and I was afraid of deep water. For two months I went to the pond with my uncle every morning and practised. At first I could only float, then I learnt to move my arms, and finally I swam right across. It helped me because now I am not afraid of water and I have learnt that anything difficult becomes easy with daily practice. It made me feel proud of myself — the same way the bird in the poem feels when it says it is “quite fit for grown-up labours”.
Q2.
Where do you see birds? What do you see the birds doing?
Answer
Answer in two lists — places first, then actions.
Where I see birds
What I see them doing
On trees, on rooftops and electric wires
Sitting in a row and calling to one another
In the fields and near ponds
Picking grains, catching insects, wading for fish
In our courtyard and on the windowsill
Drinking water, bathing in a puddle, pecking at rice
In the sky, especially at sunset
Flying home in a V-shape, circling high above
In nests among the branches
Building the nest, feeding their chicks, guarding the eggs
Sample answer: I see birds mostly in the neem tree outside my window. Early in the morning the sparrows hop about looking for insects, the crows quarrel loudly over food, and a pair of pigeons sits quietly on the wall. In the evening I see long lines of birds flying back to the trees.
Q3.
Do you want to fly like a bird? Why?
Answer
Take a clear position and then give two reasons. Either answer is right, as long as you explain it.
Sample answer (yes): Yes, I would love to fly like a bird. First, I could see my whole town at once — the fields, the river and the roof of my own school — the way the bird in the poem sees the world when it flies beyond the tree. Second, I would never have to wait for a bus again; I could visit my grandmother's village whenever I wished.
Sample answer (no): No, I would not like to fly like a bird, because a bird must search for its own food every single day and has no safe roof when it rains. I would rather watch birds fly and stay in my warm home.
Link to the poem: Flying is what makes the bird's world grow. As long as it stayed inside the shell it thought the world was a blue shell; only when it flew did it learn how big and unknown the world really is.
Q4.
What does a baby bird think about its world?
Answer
A baby bird thinks that whatever it can see at that moment is the whole world — because it has seen nothing else.
This is exactly the idea of the poem you are about to read. Inside the egg the bird thinks the world is “small and round, and made of pale, blue shell”. In the nest it thinks “the world was made of straw”. Stepping out on the branch it says “the world is made of leaves”. Each time it is honest — and each time it is wrong, because its world has only grown a little larger.
Guess before you read: Write down in one line what you think a chick believes about the world, then read the poem and see how close you were. That is the fun of this activity.
Q5.
Read the sentences and replace the underlined words with their correct meanings. (Meanings given: at last, light, labour, fluttered) 1. The colour of the feather was not dark but pale. 2. The butterfly moved lightly and quickly on to the flower. 3. Finally, I finished my bird painting after trying many times. 4. The pretty flowers were the prize for the gardener's hard work.
Answer
S.No.
Sentence
Underlined word
Meaning
1.
The colour of the feather was not dark but pale.
pale
light
2.
The butterfly moved lightly and quickly on to the flower.
moved lightly and quickly
fluttered
3.
Finally, I finished my bird painting after trying many times.
Finally
at last
4.
The pretty flowers were the prize for the gardener's hard work.
hard work
labour
The rewritten sentences:
The colour of the feather was not dark but light.
The butterfly fluttered on to the flower.
At last, I finished my bird painting after trying many times.
The pretty flowers were the prize for the gardener's labour.
Why these four words: All four come back in the poem — “made of pale, blue shell”, “I fluttered from my nest”, “At length I flew beyond the tree” (at length = at last), “quite fit for grown-up labours”. Learn them now and the poem will read easily.