CMDLearn

Learn

Class 7 Social Science: Climates of India, 8 practice questions with answers

CMDLearn ·

These are 8 practice questions on the third chapter of the new NCERT Class 7 Social Science textbook, Exploring Society: India and Beyond, Part 1, called Climates of India. Each has a short answer and the textbook page it comes from. They cover which climates suit wheat and rice, a torch model of why slanting rays heat less, hot and cold winds, the two monsoons, the Western Ghats, microclimates, what a monsoon failure does, and the two ways a flood happens. For the Earth's movements and the seasons, see our Class 8 Keeping Time with the Skies guide. Try each question before you read the answer.

These questions are our own, drafted with AI help. Every fact was checked against the page it cites, and no question retells one of the chapter's activities, boxes or exercises; 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 (Exploring Society: India and Beyond, Part 1 for Grade 7, Chapter 3, printed pages 45 to 66):

Types and causes

Question 1. The chapter links some climate types with crops. (a) In which type of climate, and in which part of India, is most of India's wheat grown? (b) Which type of climate suits rice and spices, and where is it found? Give one feature of each climate.

Answer: (a) the subtropical climate of the northern plains; (b) the tropical wet climate of the western coastal strip. (a) The northern plains are subtropical: summers there are very hot and winters cold, and this is the region that grows most of India's wheat. (b) The western coastal strip gets heavy rain in the monsoon months, which gives it a tropical wet climate that favours rice and spices. (Types of climates, page 48.)

Question 2. In a dark room, shine a torch straight down onto a table, then tilt it so the light falls at a slant. (a) What happens to the patch of light, and how does this match the chapter's explanation of why places near the poles are colder? (b) The chapter gives one more reason why slanting rays heat less. Which part of its explanation does the torch on a table not show?

Answer: (a) the slanting patch is larger and dimmer, like the Sun's oblique rays spreading the same energy over a larger surface; (b) that slanting rays travel a longer way through the air around the Earth, which weakens them. (a) Straight down, the torch's light is concentrated on a small, bright patch, like the nearly perpendicular rays near the Equator. Tilted, the same light is spread over a larger and dimmer patch, like the oblique rays in the polar regions, so each part of the surface gets less energy and less heat. (b) Near the poles the slanting rays also travel a longer path through the atmosphere, which weakens their energy further. In the room, the torch light crosses the same air either way, so this part is not shown. (The torch is our model; the explanation is the chapter's.) (Latitude, page 49.)

Question 3. (a) What kind of wind causes severe summer heat waves in states such as Rajasthan, and where does it come from? (b) What brings cold waves to the Himalayan foothills in winter?

Answer: (a) hot, dry winds from the west, which have travelled over the deserts from Arabia to Afghanistan; (b) cold winds from across the Himalayas. (a) Winds blowing from the west, after travelling over the deserts from Arabia to Afghanistan, bring dry, hot air to Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, causing heat waves. (b) In winter, cold winds from beyond the Himalayas creep into the foothills and cause cold waves. Winds also carry moisture: winds from the sea can bring rain, while those from deserts are dry. (Winds, page 52.)

The monsoons

Question 4. Most of India is dry in winter, yet parts of the east and south get rain then. Which winds bring this rain, and why do they carry moisture?

Answer: the winter, or northeast, monsoon; part of it picks up moisture as it crosses the Bay of Bengal. In winter the land cools faster than the ocean, so the winds turn round and now blow off the land towards the sea; they are dry. But part of this flow passes over the Bay of Bengal, collects moisture there, and drops rain over some eastern and southern parts of India: the winter or northeast monsoon. (The monsoons, pages 54 and 55.)

Question 5. During the summer monsoon, why do the western slopes of the Western Ghats get much more rain than the Deccan Plateau to their east?

Answer: the Western Ghats stand in the way of the monsoon winds. The summer, or southwest, monsoon winds come in from the sea carrying moisture. The Western Ghats act as a natural barrier, so their western slopes receive a lot of rain, while the Deccan Plateau on the other side receives less, often with breaks. (The southwest monsoon, page 55.)

Climate and our lives

Question 6. (a) What is a microclimate? (b) Why is a city with many concrete buildings and few trees often warmer than the countryside around it, and what is such a city called?

Answer: (a) a climate in a small area that differs from the region around it; (b) the buildings and concrete trap heat; it is an "urban heat island". (a) A microclimate is a local climate in a small area, with its own pattern of temperature, humidity and precipitation, different from the surrounding region; closed valleys and some forests have one. (b) A city packed with buildings and concrete, with hardly any greenery, traps heat, so they are often much warmer than the region around them. These are called urban heat islands. (Microclimates, page 53.)

Question 7. What can happen, step by step, when the monsoon fails, that is, when it brings too little rain?

Answer: farming suffers, water becomes scarce, workers migrate, and food prices rise. With poor monsoon rain, agriculture suffers. People, generally women, have to walk long distances to find water, and farm labourers are likely to move to cities. Food, starting with grains, vegetables and fruit, becomes more expensive, which adds to rising prices (inflation). Industry, which also depends on predictable weather and water, can suffer too. (Monsoon failure, pages 56 and 58.)

Question 8. After a night of very heavy rain, a new part of a city is flooded, though no river or lake is anywhere near it. Its streets and yards are all paved with concrete. (a) The chapter describes two ways a flood can happen. Which of them is this? (b) Why is no river needed for this kind of flood? (c) Which feature of this area means the land cannot take in the rain?

Answer: (a) heavy rainfall producing more run-off than the land can absorb; (b) the rain itself, not an overflowing river or lake, supplies the water; (c) the concrete paving. (a) A flood is water overflowing onto land that is normally dry. The chapter gives two causes: heavy rainfall producing huge run-off that the land cannot absorb, or too much water building up in rivers and lakes until it overflows or breaks their banks. With no river or lake nearby, this is the first kind. (b) The water comes straight from the sky: when more rain falls than the ground can soak up, it collects and spreads over the surface, so no river has to burst its banks. (c) Concrete and asphalt do not let water be absorbed by the earth, so almost all the rain becomes run-off. (Floods, pages 60 and 61.)

Practise more, and check your marks

Where CMDLearn fits

CMDLearn is building an AI tutor for Classes 1 to 10 that explains a step and checks the child's working, but leaves the writing to the child. It is still in development, and no child uses it yet. If you would like to hear when there is something to try, you can join the waitlist.

Sources

All opened and read on 2 November 2026. Page numbers are the printed page numbers of the textbook; printed page = PDF page + 44 for this chapter.

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