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Class 6 Science: Temperature and its Measurement, 8 practice questions with answers

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These are 8 practice questions on Chapter 7, Temperature and its Measurement, of the new NCERT Class 6 Science textbook, Curiosity. Each has a worked answer and the textbook page it comes from. They ask you to spot mistakes in using a thermometer, decide who is right when two students disagree, work out the value of one small division from a scale, fix how temperatures are written, change kelvin back to degrees Celsius, judge what "normal temperature" really means, correct an armpit reading, and give reasons for replacing a mercury thermometer. Try each one on paper before you open the answer.

These questions are our own, drafted with AI help, and every answer was checked against the textbook page it cites, but no practising teacher has reviewed them yet. If you find a mistake, please tell us.

What the chapter says you need

Facts from the NCERT textbook (Curiosity: Textbook of Science for Grade 6, Chapter 7, printed pages 123 to 141):

Using a thermometer correctly

Question 1. Ritu measures her brother's temperature with a digital clinical thermometer. She holds it by the tip, puts it under his tongue without pressing the reset button, takes it out the moment it touches his mouth, reads it, and puts it away without washing it. Find four mistakes.

Answer: she should not hold it by the tip, she should reset it first, she should wait for the beep or light, and she should wash and dry the tip afterwards. (1) The precautions say not to hold the thermometer by the tip. (2) The thermometer must be reset by pressing the reset button before it is used. (3) It should stay under the tongue until it beeps or flashes a light; the steps say to wait for that signal. (4) The tip must be washed with soap and water and dried after use (and before). (Steps and precautions for a digital clinical thermometer, page 127.)

Question 2. Hari dips a laboratory thermometer, held upright, into warm water in a beaker. To read it more easily he lifts it out of the water and sees the liquid column slowly falling. His friend says the number he is reading is no longer the temperature of the water. Who is right? What should Hari do?

Answer: the friend is right; Hari should read the thermometer while it is still in the water. As soon as a thermometer is taken out of warm water, the level of the liquid column begins to fall, so the reading no longer matches the water. Hari should keep the bulb in the water (not touching the bottom or the sides), hold the thermometer vertically, and put his eye in line with the top of the liquid column when he reads. (The correct way of measuring and the falling column, page 132.)

Reading scales and writing units

Question 3. On a laboratory thermometer, the big marks are 2 °C apart and there are 5 small divisions between neighbouring big marks. Priya says each small division is 2 × 5 = 10 °C. Find her mistake and the right value.

Answer: she multiplied; she should divide, so each small division is 0.4 °C. The temperature difference between two big marks is shared equally by the small divisions between them, so one division = 2 °C ÷ 5 = 0.4 °C. Her answer, 10 °C, is larger than the whole gap between two big marks, which cannot be right. (The smallest value a thermometer can read, page 131: the book finds 10 °C ÷ 10 divisions = 1 °C for its own thermometer.)

Question 4. A student writes: "The juice is at 8°c and the room is at 298 °K." Using the rules in the chapter, find the mistakes and rewrite each temperature correctly.

Answer: "8 °C" and "298 K". In 8°c there is no space between the number and the unit, and the symbol must be a capital C: 8 °C. In 298 °K the degree sign should not be written with kelvin: 298 K. (Writing scales, units and symbols, page 129.)

Question 5. A weather report gives the afternoon temperature in a hill town as 296.15 K. What is it on the Celsius scale?

Answer: 23 °C. Temperature in kelvin = temperature in Celsius + 273.15, so Celsius = kelvin − 273.15 = 296.15 − 273.15 = 23 °C. Kelvin is the SI unit of temperature. (The kelvin and Celsius relation, page 129; SI unit, page 128.)

Body temperature

Question 6. A healthy girl's body temperature is measured as 36.3 °C. Her cousin says, "Normal temperature is 37.0 °C, so you must be unwell." Is the cousin's reasoning right? Explain what "normal temperature" means.

Answer: not necessarily; 37.0 °C is an average, and a healthy person can be slightly above or below it. What we call normal temperature is the average body temperature of a large number of healthy people, so a perfectly healthy person may have a temperature slightly different from 37.0 °C. Body temperature is also influenced by age, the time of day and the level of activity. 36.3 °C is only a little below the average, which is the kind of small difference the chapter describes, so this reading alone does not show that she is unwell. (Anyone who feels unwell or has a high temperature should tell a parent, a teacher or another adult, who can check with a doctor.) (Normal temperature, page 128.)

Question 7. A nurse places a digital thermometer in the armpit of an elderly man and reads 35.9 °C. In what range is his actual body temperature likely to lie? Why might the armpit be used for him?

Answer: about 36.4 °C to 36.9 °C; the armpit is used for small children and old people. A temperature measured in the armpit is about 0.5 °C to 1 °C lower than the actual body temperature, so add 0.5 °C and 1 °C to the reading: 35.9 + 0.5 = 36.4 °C and 35.9 + 1 = 36.9 °C. The chapter says the digital thermometer can be placed in the armpit when measuring the body temperature of small children or old people. (Armpit measurement, page 128.)

Question 8. A school's first-aid box still has an old mercury thermometer. The principal wants to replace it with a digital one. Give two reasons from the chapter that support her.

Answer: mercury is extremely toxic and hard to dispose of if the thermometer breaks; a digital thermometer has no such risk, and its display is easier to read. Any two of these: (1) mercury is extremely toxic; (2) if a mercury thermometer breaks accidentally it is difficult to dispose of safely; (3) digital thermometers pose no such risk; (4) the numbers on a digital display are easier to read. That is why mercury thermometers are being replaced by digital ones. (Mercury and digital thermometers, page 126.)

Practise more, and check your marks

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Sources

All opened and read on 22 October 2026. Page numbers are the printed page numbers of the textbook; printed page = PDF page + 122.

The facts are from the textbook pages above. The questions and worked answers are our own. This guide is general information; follow your teacher and the textbook.