8th Standard, English Second language POETRY 2
THE LITTLE BUSY BEE
Pre Reading Task
Answer the following questions:
1. What time do you get up in the morning?
Answer: I get up 6 O’clock in the morning.
2. Do you play or study in the morning?
Answer: I study in the morning.
3. Are you entirely dependent on your parents for books and paying fees? If not, how do you earn money?
Answer: Yes, now I entirely dependent on your parents for books and paying fees. But in upcoming years I have planning to earn money.
4. How long do you study everyday usually?
Answer: I study 3 hours every day.
5. Do you go to school in time?
Answer: Yes, I go to school in time.
6. Suppose your teacher is on leave and no other teacher takes your class, how do you spend that time?
Answer: I spend the time by studying and doing extra activities when our teacher is on leave and no other teacher takes our class.
7. You have read the passage. What do you learn from the life of Sir M. Vishweshwarayya?
Answer: ‘Hard work and discipline make is successful person.’ I learn this from the life of Sir M. Vishweshwarayya
Glossary :
1. doth : old form of “does”
2. improve : make good use of
3. shining : bright
4. gather : collect
5. skillful : clever
6. cell : a small compartment in the hive
7. Satan : evil spirit or King of devils
8. mischief : injury or damage
9. idle : doing nothing
10. first years : early years/boyhood
11. give account : say what you have done
12. at last : at the end of life
C1 Answer the following questions. Share your responses with others.
1. Who is the poet speaking about?
Answer: The poet speaking about the little busy bee.
2. Why does the bee sit on the flower?
Answer: The bee sit on the flower for gather honey.
3. How does the bee build her cell?
Answer: The bee skilfully builds her cell by neatly spread her wax.
4. ‘I would be busy too’. Who does ‘I’ refer to?
Answer: I refer to the poet himself.
5. What does ‘sweet food’ mean in the context?
Answer: The ‘sweet food’ mean in the context is Honey.
6. Who does Satan manage to work through?
Answer: Satan manages to work through idle hands of the people.
C2 Pick out the best alternative for each of the following statements.
1. People like the bee because:
a. it is clever
b. it sits on the opening flower
c. it works hard
d. they get honey from it.
Answer: they get honey from it.
2. And labours hard to store it well.
Here ‘it’ refers to
a. the bee
b. the honey
c. the wax
d. the flower
Answer: the honey
Read and Write:
C3 Read and discuss your responses with your partner. Then write.
1. Why does the poet call the bee busy?
Answer: The bee is always busy with working. She was collecting honey all the day and busy with sitting every opening flowers. They are skilfully builds the hive with their wax. Then store the honey in the hive that she builds. Because of her hard working the poet called the bee busy.
2. “Let my first years be passed.”
a] What does ‘first years’ refer to?
Answer: Here ‘first years’ refers to the early years of the poet. That means his childhood days.
b] How does the poet want to spend his first years?
Answer: The poet want to spend his first years by reading books, work and healthful plays.
c] Why does he want to do so?
Answer: Because hard work will give better results at the end.
3. How can you say that the bee is intelligent and clever?
Answer: The bee is intelligent and clever because she skilfully build the cell and hive with spreading her wax. Then every day collecting the honey from the flowers. The bees are collecting nectar from the flower and convert into honey and store the honey on its hive. That is how the bee is intelligent and clever.
4. What is admirable about the work of the bee?
Answer: The bee skilfully builds her cell by neatly spread her wax. Bees are known for their hard working. Then every day collecting the honey from the flowers. The bees are collecting nectar from the flower and convert into honey and store the honey on its hive. This honey is very useful to human for their food and medicine. These are the admirable work of the bee.
5. Why does the poet want us to be like the bee?
Answer: The poet want us to be like the bee because,
a) The bee is a hard worker. We would like to be the honey bee. Hard work will make us successor.
b) The bee is collecting and storing honey from the flowers. It was helpful to the human. So we also be helpful to the society.
6. Why should we not keep ourselves idle? What will happen if we are idle?
Answer: We not keep ourselves idle because Satan finds some mischief and spoil our life. If we keep ourselves idle, we doesn’t achieve anything in our life. We have to keep us busy with hard work like bee. It gives success in our life.
7. What is the message of the poem?
Answer: The message of the poem is ‘hard work will make us successor’ and ‘Unity is the real strength.’
8. Which lines do you like the best in the poem? Give reasons for your choice.
Answer: ‘How doth the little busy bee, Improve each shining hour.’ These lines I like the best in the poem. Because bees are known for their hard working. Then every day collecting the honey from the flowers. They are busy with their work and they work hard until they collect the honey. These lines are explaining the real life of bees.
9. Pick out the rhyming words in the poem and add more words to each of the rhyming pair.
e.g. play….. day …… may
Answer: The rhyming words in the poem are,
Hour- flower, cell – well, wax – makes, skill – still, too – do, play – day,
Extended Activity:
1. Draw a picture of a bee and its hive.
2. Collect information about how honey is taken out from the cell.
Additional Reading:
Read the following poem and try to understand the message.
The Noble Nature
It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make man better be;
Or standing like an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald and sere:
A lily of a day
Is fairer far in May
Although it fall and die that night:
It was the plant and flower of light.
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in small measures life may perfect be
• Ben Jonson
Suggested Reading:
“Leave this Chanting and Singing” – Rabindranath Tagore
