This is the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) main English reader for Class VIII, Honeydew. It is an English medium (Roman script) book — the complete text, the prose, the poems and the exercises are in English, and there is no Hindi content in it. It is prescribed for CBSE schools and for state boards that follow the NCERT curriculum.
Honeydew is the principal textbook of the Class 8 English course and is read alongside It So Happened, the supplementary reader; both are prescribed and both carry weightage in the paper. The book pairs a prose piece with a poem in each unit so the two sections advance together. The prose includes The Best Christmas Present in the World, The Tsunami, Glimpses of the Past, Bepin Choudhury's Lapse of Memory, The Summit Within, This is Jody's Fawn, A Visit to Cambridge, A Short Monsoon Diary and The Great Stone Face in two parts, with poems including The Ant and the Cricket, Geography Lesson, Macavity: The Mystery Cat, The Last Bargain, The School Boy and When I Set Out for Lyonnesse.
At Class 8 the passages get longer and the questions stop being literal. Each chapter carries a "Comprehension Check" placed partway through, a "Working with the Text" section that asks about the writer's purpose and the sense behind a passage, and a "Working with Language" section that builds grammar, word formation, idiom and usage out of the text just read rather than as a detached drill. The poems have their own response questions. This is the structure the school paper follows, and it is why the prescribed text repays being read as written — a guide summary removes precisely the language material the questions are drawn from.
The selections are varied enough to hold a Class 8 reader's attention — a war story, a natural disaster, a comic mystery poem, a mountaineering account, a diary — and the text is illustrated throughout.
Key Features:
English medium book — complete content written in English (Roman script), no Hindi content
Published by NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training)
Honeydew — Textbook in English for Class VIII (Class 8), the main reader
Prescribed for CBSE schools and state boards following the NCERT curriculum
Read alongside It So Happened, the Class 8 supplementary reader
Units pair a prose piece with a poem so both sections advance together
Prose includes The Best Christmas Present in the World, The Tsunami, Glimpses of the Past
Prose includes Bepin Choudhury's Lapse of Memory, The Summit Within, This is Jody's Fawn
Prose includes A Visit to Cambridge, A Short Monsoon Diary, The Great Stone Face (Parts I and II)
Poems include The Ant and the Cricket, Geography Lesson, Macavity: The Mystery Cat
Poems include The Last Bargain, The School Boy, When I Set Out for Lyonnesse
"Comprehension Check" within each chapter
"Working with the Text" questions on purpose, character and meaning
"Working with Language" sections — grammar, word formation, idiom and usage in context
Illustrated throughout
Base textbook for the Class 8 English examination
Standard NCERT text — the base book before any guide or question bank
यह पुस्तक राष्ट्रीय शैक्षिक अनुसंधान और प्रशिक्षण परिषद (NCERT) द्वारा कक्षा VIII (कक्षा 8) अंग्रेज़ी पाठ्यक्रम हेतु निर्धारित मुख्य पाठ्यपुस्तक Honeydew है। ध्यान दें: यह पुस्तक पूर्णतः अंग्रेज़ी भाषा एवं रोमन लिपि में है — इसमें हिन्दी भाषा का प्रयोग नहीं है। यह पूरक पुस्तक It So Happened के साथ पढ़ी जाती है; सम्पूर्ण पाठ्यक्रम हेतु दोनों पुस्तकें निर्धारित हैं। इसमें गद्य एवं पद्य दोनों खंड सम्मिलित हैं — The Best Christmas Present in the World, The Tsunami, Glimpses of the Past, Bepin Choudhury's Lapse of Memory, The Summit Within, A Short Monsoon Diary, The Great Stone Face जैसे गद्य पाठ तथा The Ant and the Cricket, Geography Lesson, Macavity: The Mystery Cat, The Last Bargain, The School Boy जैसी कविताएँ। प्रत्येक पाठ के साथ "Comprehension Check", "Working with the Text" (भाव एवं उद्देश्य आधारित प्रश्न) तथा "Working with Language" (व्याकरण, शब्द-रचना एवं प्रयोग) खंड दिए गए हैं। इस स्तर पर प्रश्न केवल स्मरण पर नहीं, अपितु समझ एवं भाषा-कौशल पर आधारित होते हैं।
