How to do it. Open the kitchen shelf at home with an elder's permission and write down what you find, sorted into groups. Bring the list to class, put everyone's lists side by side, and mark the items that appear on almost every list — those are the ‘unity’.
Sample answer — a list from one home, arranged the way the chapter arranges it:
| Group | What is on the shelf | Found in almost every Indian home? |
|---|---|---|
| Cereals | Rice, wheat flour (atta), semolina (suji), barley | Yes — the chapter names rice, barley and wheat |
| Millets | Bajra (pearl millet), jowar (sorghum), ragi (finger millet) | Yes — all three are named in the chapter |
| Pulses | Arhar/tur dal, moong dal, masoor dal, chana dal, urad dal, rajma, lobia, chickpea | Yes — “various kinds of dals and grams” |
| Spices | Turmeric, cumin, cardamom, ginger, coriander seed, mustard seed, black pepper, cloves, cinnamon, chilli | The first four are named in the chapter as used “throughout the country” |
| Oils | Groundnut oil, mustard oil, coconut oil, sesame (til) oil | Which one is the everyday oil changes by region — mustard in the east and north, coconut in Kerala, groundnut in the west, sesame in parts of the south |
| Everyday vegetables | Onion, potato, tomato, brinjal, okra (bhindi), bottle gourd, spinach | Common almost everywhere, but cooked in completely different ways |
What the comparison shows. The grains, pulses and spices columns will be nearly identical across the whole class, even when classmates come from different States. The oils and the ready-made pastes and powders will differ the most — panch phoron in a Bengali kitchen, sambar podi in a Tamil one, garam masala in a Punjabi one, bhut jolokia in an Assamese one. Same base, different finish: that is the chapter's point in one shelf.