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CBSE Computational Thinking and AI books for Classes 3 to 8: the 12 official handbooks, explained
In short: CBSE has published a free Student Handbook and a free Teacher Handbook for each of Classes 3 to 8 for its new Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence (CT & AI) course, 12 PDFs in all. They are on CBSE's own CT & AI page, cbseacademic.nic.in/ct-ai.html. They are not new textbooks: each one works alongside the NCERT Mathematics textbook of that class, chapter by chapter. From Class 6, each book adds a separate part on AI. You do not need to buy a private "CT and AI book" to follow the CBSE course.
Where the official books are
CBSE announced the books in Circular Acad-18/2026, dated 9 April 2026, addressed to the heads of all its affiliated schools. The circular asks schools to download the resource books and use them in class. Its own description is that they are "not designed as textbooks" but as "a companion" to the NCERT Maths books, with ideas from The World Around Us (TWAU) woven in.
All 12 files are linked, class by class, on CBSE's CT & AI page: cbseacademic.nic.in/ct-ai.html. The same page links the curriculum framework and the circular. Every book we read says "First Edition: March, 2026" and names CBSE as the publisher.
The page counts are the PDF pages, covers included. The files are 2.5 to 9.4 MB, so on a slow phone connection download one class at a time.
Student Handbook or Teacher Handbook: what is the difference?
Both follow the same chapters. The Student Handbook has the activities and the questions, many of them multiple choice. The Teacher Handbook repeats them and adds the answers, with a worked solution for each CT question (the AI chapters of Classes 6 to 8 have an answer list at the end of each chapter); a few activities also carry a label for the thinking skill they practise. That is why the teacher books are longer.
A tip for parents: if your child brings a CT question home, work it out together from the Student Handbook first. Open the Teacher Handbook only to check, because the books themselves ask teachers to guide with prompts and give children time, and say that the thinking matters more than the right answer.
Classes 3 to 5: one book, the Maths chapters
For Classes 3, 4 and 5 there is no AI part. Each book is a set of thinking questions and short activities arranged chapter by chapter in the same order as the class's NCERT Maths textbook, so the Maths teacher can use them in the normal Maths period. The framework suggests about 50 hours a year for this stage (our guide to the CT and AI curriculum explains the hours and assessment).
| Class | Chapters in the handbook (after "Introduction" and "How to use this book") |
|---|---|
| 3 | What's in a Name?; Toy Joy; Double Century; Vacation with My Nani Maa; Fun with Shapes; House of Hundreds I; Raksha Bandhan; Fair Share; House of Hundreds II; Fun at Class Party!; Filling and Lifting; Give and Take; Time Goes On; The Surajkund Fair |
| 4 | Shapes Around Us; Hide and Seek; Patterns Around Us; Thousands Around Us; Sharing and Measuring; Measuring Length; The Cleanest Village; Weigh It, Pour It; Equal Groups; Elephants, Tigers, and Leopards; Fun with Symmetry; Ticking Clocks and Turning Calendar; The Transport Museum; Data Handling |
| 5 | We the Travellers I; Fractions; Angles as Turns; We the Travellers II; Far and Near; The Dairy Farm; Shapes and Patterns; Weight and Capacity; Coconut Farm; Symmetrical Designs; Grandmother's Quilt; Racing Seconds; Animal Jumps; Maps and Locations; Data Through Pictures |
What a chapter looks like: the Class 3 book opens its first chapter with a secret-code activity (shifting each letter of the alphabet by a fixed number, the idea behind a Caesar cipher) and links it to why a bank PIN or a UPI payment has to stay hidden. Children then encode a message for a friend, who decodes it with the key, and answer questions on shifted words. No computer is needed for any of this.
Classes 6 to 8: two parts, CT and then AI
From Class 6 each handbook has Part 1, Computational Thinking, again following the Maths textbook's chapters, and Part 2, Artificial Intelligence, with four chapters. Each AI chapter also names an "ethical awareness" focus. The framework gives this stage about 100 hours a year; for Class 6 the book splits it as 40 hours of CT, 20 hours of AI and 40 hours for two cross-subject projects.
| Class | Part 1: CT chapters (follow the Maths textbook) | Part 2: AI chapters |
|---|---|---|
| 6 | Patterns in Mathematics; Lines and Angles; Number Play; Data Handling and Presentation; Prime Time; Perimeter and Area; Fractions; Playing with Constructions; Symmetry; The Other Side of Zero | 1. Introduction to AI and everyday examples; 2. Basic data concepts; 3. Simple pattern recognition and decision making; 4. Ethics and digital responsibility (online safety, privacy, passwords, digital footprints) |
| 7 | Large Numbers Around Us; Arithmetic Expressions; A Peek Beyond the Point; Expressions using Letter-Numbers; Parallel and Intersecting Lines; Number Play; A Tale of Three Intersecting Lines; Working with Fractions | 1. AI domains and applications (computer vision, natural language processing, data science); 2. AI in industries such as healthcare, education and transport; 3. Data visualisation and analysis; 4. Ethics and AI bias |
| 8 | A Square and a Cube; Power Play; A Story of Numbers; Quadrilaterals; Number Play; We Distribute Yet Things Multiply; Proportional Reasoning | 1. The AI project lifecycle; 2. AI and its applications; 3. Data and fairness in AI; 4. Ethics and responsible AI |
The step up is clear. Class 6 explains what AI is and how it differs from a machine that only follows fixed instructions. Class 7 looks at where AI is used and at bias. Class 8 walks through how an AI project is planned, built and checked, and is the only book where we found step-by-step work in a named online tool: it suggests free no-code sites such as Teachable Machine and Machine Learning for Kids, for example to train a model that sorts photos of waste into plastic, paper and organic. We found no such tool steps in the Class 6 and 7 AI chapters, so those can start with talk and paper.
"Computational thinking and AI" for Class 9?
The handbooks stop at Class 8. Circular Acad-18/2026 also says that the earlier AI courses are being discontinued for Class 9 from the 2026-27 session, that Class 10 students in 2026-27 continue with the 2025-26 scheme, and that NCERT will provide CT and AI modules for Classes 9 to 12 for 2026-27, to be used for internal assessment. NCERT has since published the module: An Introductory Module on Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence for the Secondary Stage (Grades 9-12), first edition October 2026, a 108-page PDF planned for 20 hours of class time, free to download from NCERT's website (link under Sources). It was not linked from CBSE's CT & AI page when we checked on 7 November 2026, so check the date and source of any other "Class 9 CT and AI PDF" you find.
Do you need to buy a CT and AI book?
Not for the CBSE course. CBSE's books are free, and the circular asks schools to download and use them. Several publishers sell their own "computational thinking and AI" books for 2026-27; those are private titles, not CBSE's. If a school asks for one, it is fair to ask whether it adds anything the free handbooks do not.
How to use the handbooks at home or in class
- Keep the Maths book next to it. The CT questions build on the chapter your child is doing in Maths, so they work best in the same week as that chapter.
- Ask "how did you get it?" The books are about the steps: breaking a problem into parts, spotting a pattern, writing clear instructions. A wrong answer with a sensible method is a good conversation.
- For the AI part, start with talk, not apps. Our ten-minute explanation of AI for a Class 6 student and the AI activities that need no computer fit the Class 6 and 7 chapters. Teachers can use the one-period Hour of AI plan as a first lesson.
- State board school? These books are for CBSE schools. Your child's board decides its own syllabus, but the books are free to read and the thinking skills are the same.
Honest status
- We are not affiliated with CBSE or NCERT. This page summarises the official books; it is not one of them, and we do not copy their questions here.
- CMDLearn is building an AI tutor and AI-literacy lessons for Classes 1 to 10. The tutor is still being built and no school or child uses it yet. If you would like to hear when early access opens, you can join the waitlist. Nothing we make is needed for the CBSE course.
- If CBSE posts a new edition or more books, the list above may change. Check the CT & AI page for the latest files.
Sources
- CBSE Circular Acad-18/2026, 9 April 2026, Students' and Teachers' Resource books for course on Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence (CT&AI) for classes 3rd to 8th: cbseacademic.nic.in/web_material/Circulars/2026/18_Circular_2026.pdf
- CBSE CT & AI page with the 12 handbooks, the framework and the circular, read 7 Nov 2026: cbseacademic.nic.in/ct-ai.html
- The 12 Student and Teacher Handbooks, First Edition March 2026, contents pages and "How to use this book" sections read 7 Nov 2026 (links in the table above).
- CBSE curriculum framework for CT and AI, Classes III to VIII: cbseacademic.nic.in/web_material/CurriculumMain27/CTAI_Pri_2026-27.pdf
- NCERT, An Introductory Module on Computational Thinking and Artificial Intelligence for the Secondary Stage (Grades 9-12) (UN514), First Edition October 2026, read 7 Nov 2026: ncert.nic.in/pdf/An_Introductory_Module_AI_CT_UN514.pdf