TS 8th Class Biology Study Material 1st Lesson What is Science?

Telangana SCERT 8th Class Biology Study Material Telangana Pdf 1st Lesson Nutrition Textbook Questions and Answers.

TS 8th Class Biology 1st Lesson Questions and Answers Telangana – What is Science?

Question 1.
Define the following:
Answer:

• Ecologist : The scientist who deals with the behaviours and patterns of living organisms in response to non-living things / nature.
• Geologist : (Paleontologist): The scientist who deals with fossils.
• Astrophysicist: The scientist who takes the photographs and analyses the galaxies of universe.
• Climatologist: Collects the data and interprets the changes of weather.
• Chemist: The scientist who understands the various reactions of chemical substances at various temperatures.
• Biologist: The scientist who studies living organisms and their internal structures.

Question 2.
Explain the term “SCIENCE”.
Answer:

• The word science comes from Latin word “SCIENTIA” means knowledge. So science is a system of acquiring knowledge.
• The organised body of knowledge, people have gained using that system. Any systematic field of study or the knowledge gained from it.

Question 3.
Science is explained as the individual perspective. Convey your opinion.
Answer:
In most cases, scientists collect information to test new ideas or to disprove old ones. They become famous for discovering new things that change with our thinking about nature. Many scientists find their greatest joy in an unknown fact that explains some problem previously not explained or that overturns some previously accepted idea.
Thus science is explained as the individual perspective.

Question 4.
Explain the SOCIETAL perspective of science ?
Answer:

• The societies and nations help scientists to work on science.
• A society devotes some of its resources to this business of developing new knowledge about the world.
  Ex : Biologist identifies the pathway (or) life cycle of pathogens causing dreadful diseases.
  Geneticists analyse the flow of genes from generation to generation.
• Scientists find efficient ways to discover or recover natural resources like petroleum and ores.
• Societies also support science because of simple curiosity and to gain the knowledge of the world around us.

Question 5.
How the scientists help the nation to improve the Economic standards of its people ?
Answer:

• Many earth scientists find more efficient and effective ways to discover and recover the natural resources like petroleum and ores.
• Botanist and plant scientists develop new varieties or species of fruit plants and crops which give high yield, at low agricultural productivity cost.
• Chemists develop new chemical substances with potential technological application and spur the economic development.
• Physicist develops the phenomena like super conductivity which is used in Telecommunications.
• These discoveries help in increasing the standard of people and the economic standards of the country.

Question 6.
“Science is a subject of dynamism” Justify ?
Answer:

• Scientists constantly make new discoveries and develop new concepts and theories.
• So the body of knowledge produced by science undergoes constant changes.
• It makes us to understand nature in a better way.
• So science is not static, it is dynamic and keeps on changing.
• Albert Einstein remarked, – “Every year retracts what it wrote the year before”.

Question 7.
Explain the scientific method.
Answer:

• The specific way followed by scientist for their innovations is known as “SCIENTIFIC METHOD”.
• The organized way to plan and conduct the process skills of science is known as Scientific Method.

Question 8.
How many steps are there in the Scientific Method. List them out.
Answer:
Scientific method has five steps. They are :

• Observation and asking questions.
• Forming a hypothesis.
• Planning an experiment.
• Conducting the experiment.
• Drawing conclusions and communicating results.

Question 9.
What is the first step of the scientific method. List out conditions necessary to explain the first step.
Answer:

• Observation and asking questions is the first step for scientific method.
• The following conditions are necessary for the proper observation and to prepare the questions.
• Using our senses to make observations.
• Writing the known details of the topic / question.
• Deciding exactly which information is required.
• Doing research to find more information about the topic.

Question 10.
How do you plan up to conduct an experiment ?
(or)
What suggestions you will give to your friend regarding experiments?
Answer:

• To conduct an experiment we must have a plan. While planning we should decide how to conduct a fair test of hypothesis by controlling variables.
• Variables are the factors that can affect the outcome of the investigation.
• We have to write down the steps that we follow to do the test.
• Listing out equipment we need to do the experiment.
• Deciding that how we will gather and record the data of experimentation.

Question 11.
Ravi has sown seeds in the school campus. He observed the germination of the seeds. What are the conditions that Ravi has to follow to conduct this experiment and to inform the same to his friends ?
Answer:

• Ravi conducted the experiment as per the steps he planned.
• He observed the pots / area where he had sown the seeds daily and measured the growth of the seedling carefully.
• He recorded everything that happened in the seedlings.
• He organized the data in a proper order.
• By following the above conditions he could conduct the experiment, and the same will be informed to his friends.

Question 12.
The Hypothesis “All seeds will germinate and grow equally in all soils” is proved wrong by Abdul through conducting an experiment with pea seeds in different soils. What conditions should have been followed by Abdul to prove the hypothesis and to draw the conclusions and communicating the results of the experiments ?
Answer:

• Abdul planned to conduct a test using potting soil, sandy soil, and clay soil for the germination of pea seeds.
• Each flower pot got the same amount of water and light, (water & light – controlling variables).
• Abdul measured each plant for every 3 days and recorded the results in a table.
• He analysed the results through a bar graph and recorded the height of each plant up to a certain period.
• He wrote the conclusion, i.e., seeds did not sprout in the clay soil”.
• The hypothesis of germination of seeds is compared with the result.
• Abdul tested the hypothesis whether it was correct (or) incorrect.
• Seeds sprouted best in a combination of clay, sandy & potted soil.

Question 13.
What do you mean by process skills and when we will use it ?
Answer:

• When scientists try to find an answer to a question (or) do an experiment, they use thinking tools called process skills.
• We use many of the process skills whenever we speak, listen, read, write or think.

Question 14.
Give examples for the process skills of “Observation, Compare, Classification, Measure, Gather, Record, Display and Interpret”.
Answer:

• Observation: We use the sense organs to learn about objects and events.
• Compare: Identify characteristics of things (or) events to find out how they are alike or different.
• Classification: Based on specific conditions / characteristic grouping (or) organising objects / events into categories.
• Measure : Compare and attribute to an object, such as mass, length (or) capacity to a unit of measure, such as gram, centimetre (or) liter.
• Gather : For predictions and inferences of the experiment, the observed data should be gathered.
• Record: Writing the observations in a table, graph, or note book is known as recording data.
• Display: Displaying the data by making tables, charts & graphs.
• Interpret: Interpreting the data by drawing conclusions about the collected ones.

Question 15.
Sheethal is explaining the following process skills with examples to his friends. If you explain the same to your friends what examples you will give ?
Answer:

• Use a model: To understand an idea, an object, an event, (or) how something works, making a representation just like that of the original.
• Predict: Forming an idea of an expected out come, based on observations (or) through experiences.
• Inference : Using logical reasoning to explain events and drawing conclusions based on observations.
• Hypothesis : Making a statement about an expected outcome.
• Plan and conduct experiment : Identifying and performing the steps necessary to test a hypothesis, using appropriate tools. Recording and analysing the data are to be done.
• Control variables : Identifying the control factors that affect the out come of an experiment. Only one variable should be tested in an experiment.

Question 16.
Swetha wants to know what brand of paper towel absorbs the most water, because she wants to tell her father the best brand to buy ? How did she use her process skills ?
Answer:

• Swetha chooses three brands of paper towels. She hypothesizes that “one brand will absorb more water than the others”.
• She plans and conducts experiments to test her hypothesis using the following steps.
• Pour one litre of water into each of the three beakers.
• Put a towel from each of the three brands into a different beaker for ten seconds.
• Pull the towel out of the water and let it drain back into the beaker for five seconds.
• Measure the amount of water left in each beaker.
• Swetha controls variables by making sure each beaker contains exactly the same amount of water and by timing each step in her experiment exactly.

Question 17.
Neelima is explaining the startegies of a good science reader to her friends. If you are in the place of Neelima what strategies you will give ?
Answer:

• Reading everything about a topic for which the scientist / reader investigates.
• If the topic is about Ecosystem,we have to find out how ecosystem is orgainsed in nature.
• Look at the vocabulary of words, be sure that you can produce each word.
• Look up each word in the glossary, using the word in a sentence to show its meaning.
• Reading the title of the section; finding the main idea & details of the paragraphs.
• Checking the understanding of what you have read.
• Summarise what you have read.
• Studying the photographs & illustrations.

Think : I need to know what an Ecosystem is. I need to read to find out what the parts of an ecosystem are. The headings of different ecosystems give me a clue that an ecosystem may have both living and non living parts.

Question 18.
Let us observe the following table of different species.
Answer:

Flora and Fauna	Name of the species
Plants	Orchid species, sandal wood tree, cycas, medicinal plants, Rauvolfia serpentine etc.
Animals	Leopard, Indian Lion, indian Wolf, Red Fox, Red Panda, Tiger, Desert Cat, Hyena etc. Gharial, Tortoise, Python, Green sea turtle etc. Peacock, Great Indian bustard, Pelican, Great Indian homed bill etc. Golden monkey, Lion tailed macaque, Nilgiri Langour, Loris.

Endemic Species : Observe the pictures and identify the animals. Also try to find out where these can be found?

You may find that these animals are specifically found in certain regions of the world.
You are also aware of the fact that many plants and animals are widely distributed throught out the world. But some species of plants and animals are found restricted to some areas only. Plants or animal species found restricted to a particular area of a country are called Endemic species.

• Name an Endemic Species of our State?
• You may notice that kangaroo is endemic to Australia and Kiwi to New Zealand. Can you tell which among the above pictures represents an endemic species of India? Name some other endemic species of India. You can take help of books from your school library or internet.

If you want to become a good Science Reader what you will recognise by reading the above article ?
Answer:

• I will find the main idea in the first paragraph i.e., Groups of living things and their environment make up an ecosystem.
• I can find the details in the next paragraph that support the main idea.
• Some ecosystems have only a few living things.
• Environment that has more space, food and shelter has many living things.
• Plants and animals in ecosystem can meet all their basic needs from their ecosystem.
• I can check up the understanding of what I have read through following questions.
• Answer the questions at the end of the section.
• If I am not sure of the answer I read (the section) again and again and look for the answers.
• Summarise what I have read.
• I think about what I have already learned about systems and interactions.
• I can do self-assessment on the article by the following way.
• What kind of system is an ecosystem?
• What interactions occur in an Ecosystem? Then I study the photographs and illustrations; captions & labels.
• I think about what kind of ecosystem is shown in the photographs.
• What are the non living parts of the ecosystem?
• What living parts of ecosystem are shown?
• Reading in this way about science helps us to understand and to derive conclusions based on the investigations.

Question 19.
What uses do we get by interpreting data. (Conceptual understanding)
Answer:

• Scientists collect, organise, display and interpret data as they investigate.
• Scientists choose a way to display data that helps others to understand what they have learned.
• Tables, charts, and graphs are the good tools to display data so that it can be interpreted by others.

Question 20.
While doing science experiments what essential and safety precautions should we take?
Answer:
The following rules are to be implemented while doing investigations in science labs.
1. Think ahead : Study the steps of the investigation so that we can know what to expect. Be sure that you can understand any safety symbols that are shown.

2. Be neat: If you have long hair, pull it back so that it doesn’t get in the way. Roll off or push up long sleeves to keep them away from your experiment. Keep your working area clean.

3. Getting the permission : If you want to do anything in the lab, you should get prior permission from the lab incharges.

4. Caring of eyes: Wear safety goggles when you are directed to do so.

5. Never eat! drink anything in the lab : While doing an activity in science lab, do not eat / drink any thing unless you are told to do so by your teacher.

6. Protect yourself from Shocks: Be careful while using electric tools. Don’t ever pull a plug out an outlet by pulling the cord.

7. Keep it clean: Always clean up work area when you have finished an activity. Wash you hands.

Question 21.
Briefly explain the steps of scientific methods to your friends?
Answer:
The steps of scientific method are
1. Identifying the problem: From our surroundings identifying and defining a specific problem.
Eg: The bulb did not light in the room.

2. Making hypothesis : Writing as many as possible answers (or) hypothesis for defined problem.
Eg: If a bulb is not glowing, the filament may be burnt off, fuse may be off. Switch may not be working properly or loose contact of wires.

3. Collecting information/Collection of data : To solve the defined problem, making a list of items required, books required, preparing a list of persons whom we should meet etc.

4. Analysis of data : Organising the collected data in a proper order to plan and conduct the experiment.

5. Conducting the experiment: Testing the hypothesis by conducting an experiment.
Eg : Observing the filament of the bulb.

6. Drawing conclusions : Compare the results of the experiment to solve the problem. If hypothesis is not continued through results of experiment, the experiment should be conducted with another hypothesis.
Eg: If the filament of the bulb is good, observe the fuse, fuse wire might be cut off. So fuse wire has to be replaced.

7. Inference: Drawing conclusions based on the observations of experiments.
Ex: Bulb is not glown due to the cut off of fuse wire.

8. Following a specific way to find out the solution of a problem is known as scientific method.

TS 8th Class Biology 1st Lesson What is Science? Important Questions

Question 1.
What do you mean by science?
Answer:
The organised body of knowledge, people have gained by observations and experimentation to describe and explain the natural phenomena.

Question 2.
What do you mean by hypothesis?
Answer:
A possible answer that can be tested.

Question 3.
What do you mean by variables?
Answer:
The factors that can affect the outcome of the investigation.

Question 4.
How will scientists use the numbers in the scientific method ?
Answer:
Scientists use numbers when they collect and display data. They use many different measuring instruments, such as thermometer, clocks, times, rulers, spring scale, analytical balance, beakers and other containers to measure liquids.

Question 5.
“Identifying and defining the problem is the secret of inventions”.
support your answer with two examples? (Application)
Answer:

• The earth is rotating round the sun, even before the Kopemicus has put forward his theory (or) theorem of heliocentric theory.
• The items which were thrown up reach the ground even before the theory of gravitational force was put forwarded by Newton.
• These two scientists have thought in a different way to identify the problem, instead of a normal routine thinking.
• It leads to specific observation to the Newton and Kopernicus theories.
• Necessity is the mother of invention.

Choose the correct answers:

I. Conceptual Understanding

Question 1.
Which of the following scientists identified super conductivity? ( )
A) Chemists
B) Plant scientists
C) Physicist
D) Geologist

Question 2.
‘Pea seeds germinate very well in the garden soil ‘To which of the following step of scientific method it belongs? ( )
A) Experiment
B) Observation
C) Conclusion
D) Hypothesis

Question 3.
Which of the following scientific method is used when we observe the length of plants? ( )
A) Confirmation
B) Experimentation
C) Hypothesis
D) Solving the problem

Question 4.
Which process skill is used to group (or) organise objects into categories based on their specific characteristics? ( )
A) Classification
B) Comparing
C) Observation
D) Planning

Question 5.
Which of the following process skill affects the outcome of an experiment and acts as controlling factor? ( )
A) Defining
B) Interpretation
C) Control variable
D) All the above

Question 6.
Who said “Science is a history of corrected mistakes.
A) Karl Popper
B) Albert Einstein
C) Karl Marks
D) Leonardo Da Vinci

Question 7.
Whose ideas are reiterated with the following sentence? “ every year retracts what he wrote the year before.
A) Ozil Man
B) Oliver Strawn
C) Albert Einstein
D) Karl Popper

Question 8.
Science is a process of …………
A) Reasoning
B) Questioning
C) Thinking
D) Experimentation

Question 9.
Raja said that ecologist deals with relation between organisms and environment. But Lakshmi said that he deals with environment and resources ( )
A) Raja is correct
B) Lakshmi is correct
C) Both are correct
D) Both are wrong

Question 10.
Tables, charts, graphs are useful in ( )
A) synthesis
B) analysis
C) experiments
D) conclusion

Question 11.
Find out the incorrect process skill. ( )
A) Hypothesis
B) Observation
C) Classification
D) Note making

Question 12.
The person who studies the distribution of fossils:
A) Paleoentologist
B) Geologist
C) Ecologist
D) Physiologist

Question 13.
The person who observes the tissues and cells: ( )
A) Cytologist
B) Microbiologist
C) Astrophysicist
D) Climatologist

Question 14.
A functional unit of nature is called ( )
A) Environment
B) Pond
C) Forest
D) Eco system

II. Asking Questions and making Hypothesis 

Question 15.
Prediction is one of the skills ( )
A) Observation
B) Process
C) Experiment
D) Document

III. Experimentation and Field Investigation 

Question 16.
Find out the incorrect rule maintained in the science labs: ( )
A) Think ahead
B) Watch your eyes
C) Wear Slippers
D) Yuck

Question 17.
Arrange the collected data to conduct experiments: ( )
A) Experimentation
B) Data analysis
C) Genaralisation
D) Conclusion