NCERT Solutions Curiosity Chapter 6 Extended activities and projects — Learning further

Book page 121 Updated on2026-09-05

Q1.

Gather information on different materials which can be recycled. You can take help from various sources, such as newspapers, magazines, elders in your community, and the internet.

Answer

How to do it: collect information from three kinds of sources — the newspaper (municipal notices about waste segregation), an elder or the kabadiwala in your mohalla, and a reliable website. Write down each fact with the source next to it.

Sample answer — materials that can be recycled:

Material	Examples of items	What it is turned into
Paper and cardboard	Old newspapers, notebooks, cartons	New paper, egg trays, packing board
Glass	Bottles, jars, broken panes	Melted and blown into new bottles and jars
Metals — iron, aluminium, copper, brass	Old utensils, cans, wires, taps, nails	Melted and cast into new metal goods; metals can be recycled again and again
Plastics — PET, HDPE	Water and cold-drink bottles, buckets, mugs	Chips, fibre for cloth and carpets, new plastic articles
Cloth and rags	Old clothes, gunny bags	Cleaning cloth, yarn, mattress filling
E-waste	Old phones, chargers, circuit boards	Copper, gold and other metals are recovered
Rubber	Worn-out tyres, slippers	Playground mats, road-making material
Kitchen (wet) waste	Peels, leftovers, leaves	Compost for the garden — this is recycling too

Why recycling depends on properties: a material can be recycled only if it can be melted, pulped or broken down and made again without losing its useful properties. Metals and glass melt cleanly, so they recycle perfectly. Thermocol and laminated wrappers do not, which is why nobody buys them.

Q2.

Recyclers buy old objects based on properties of the materials and do not bother even if an object is broken. Conduct a survey with recyclers near you and find out what properties of materials do they check before buying objects from households. Which materials do they not buy and why?

Answer

How to conduct the survey: visit the kabadiwala with an elder, greet him, tell him it is a school project, and ask five or six prepared questions. Note the answers on the spot in a table. Ask the rate per kilogram for each material, and thank him at the end.

Questions to carry: What do you buy? How do you decide the price? How do you tell one metal from another? What do you refuse to take, and why? What happens to the material after it leaves you?

Sample answer — properties a recycler checks:

Property checked	How he checks it	Why it matters to him
Which material it is	By look, by the sound it makes when tapped, by the feel	Every material has a different rate per kg
Mass (weight)	Weighs it on his balance	He pays by the kilogram, not by the piece — so a broken object is worth the same as a whole one
Whether a magnet sticks	Touches a small magnet to it	Iron sticks; copper, brass and aluminium do not and fetch a much higher price
Colour and lustre	Scratches the surface and looks at the fresh metal	Reddish shine = copper, yellow = brass, silvery = aluminium or steel
Whether it is clean and dry	Looks and smells	Food-stained or oily plastic and wet paper cannot be recycled well
Whether materials are mixed	Checks for rubber, plastic or cloth attached to metal	Mixed articles have to be separated by hand, which costs him labour

Materials they usually do not buy, and why:

Thermocol — very light, so a whole sackful weighs almost nothing and fetches no money.
Thin polythene bags, chips and biscuit wrappers — these are made of layers of different materials stuck together and cannot be separated or melted.
Broken crockery, ceramic tiles, mirror glass — cannot be melted into new articles easily and can cut the hands of the workers.
Used tissue paper, soiled or wet paper, and food-stained containers — cannot be pulped cleanly.
Old batteries, tube lights and paint tins — hazardous, and need special handling.

The chapter’s idea at work: the kabadiwala is doing exactly what you did in Activity 6.2 — classifying by properties. He does not care what the object was; he cares only what material it is made of, because that is what decides whether it can be used again.

Q3.

Collect 20–30 objects from your household and classify them based on the properties of the materials they are made up of. Were you able to put them in separate groups? What relationship do you see between the properties of the materials and the use of the objects?

Answer

How to do it: collect 20–30 safe, small objects on a mat — spoon, key, comb, bangle, eraser, marble, sponge, candle, chalk, nail, notebook, plastic mug, ball, diya, bulb, rubber band, coin, cloth piece, wooden ruler, glass jar. Then sort them once for each property.

Property used	Group 1	Group 2	Group 3
Lustre	Lustrous — spoon, key, coin, nail	Non-lustrous — chalk, cloth, notebook, sponge
Hardness	Hard — marble, bangle, coin, diya	Soft — eraser, sponge, cloth, rubber band
Transparency	Transparent — glass jar, marble, bulb	Translucent — butter paper, plastic mug	Opaque — spoon, comb, diya, notebook
Solubility in water	Soluble — sugar, salt, a glucose tablet	Insoluble — nail, chalk, candle, sponge

Were you able to put them in separate groups? Yes — for a single property every object lands in exactly one group. But an object that is made of more than one material (a pen, a torch, a bag with a metal buckle) is hard to place; put it in the group of the material it has most of, and write a note.

The relationship between properties and use:

A tumbler is made of a material that holds water and is hard — steel, glass, plastic, clay. Never cloth or paper.
A window is made of a transparent material so that light and the view come in.
A pillow is made of a soft material so it is comfortable.
A hammer head is hard and heavy, its handle is light and warm to hold — two different materials in one tool.
A raincoat is made of a material that does not soak water.

The one-line conclusion: the use of an object is decided by the properties of the material it is made of. We choose the material to fit the job, which is why the same object made for a different job is made of a different material.

Q4.

Create and decorate a useful object of your choice using discarded materials and bring it to the class. Discuss with your friends what they have made and the materials they have used. Additionally, provide constructive feedback on areas for improvement, considering functionality and any other points.

Answer

What a good project must have: it should be useful (not just decorative), made mainly from discarded materials, safe to handle, and you should be able to explain why each material was chosen.

Sample answer — a pen stand from a discarded plastic bottle:

Materials used: one empty 1 L plastic bottle, old newspaper, waste cloth pieces, a discarded cardboard carton, glue, and left-over poster colours.
Making it: ask an elder to cut the bottle to about 12 cm height and smooth the cut edge by folding tape over it. Paste a cardboard disc under it for a firm base. Cover the outside with strips of newspaper and glue, let it dry, then paint it and stick on cloth flowers.
Why these materials: plastic is hard enough to stand up, light and water-proof, so ink spills wipe off; cardboard is stiff and makes the base steady; cloth and paper are soft and easily glued, so they decorate well.

Other good ideas: a bird feeder from a bottle and two spoons; a jewellery box from a match box and old gift paper; a doormat woven from strips of old sarees; a lamp shade from a punched tin can; a jute pen-holder from a can and old jute twine; a mobile stand from a shampoo bottle.

How to give constructive feedback in class: say one thing that works and one thing that could be better, and always give a reason.

Look at	Ask	Example of good feedback
Functionality	Does it really work and hold up in daily use?	“Your pen stand is beautiful, but it tips over when full. A wider cardboard base will fix it.”
Choice of material	Was the property of the material suited to the job?	“A paper flower pot will get soggy the first time you water it — line it with an old polythene sheet.”
Safety	Any sharp edges, loose pins or unsafe glue?	“Cover the cut edge of the can with tape so nobody cuts a finger.”
Use of waste	How much of it came from discarded things?	“Almost everything is reused — only the glue was bought. Very well done.”

Tip: Say what you liked before you say what should change, and speak about the object, never about the person. That is what makes feedback constructive.

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