Class 7 Sample Paper English (Half Yearly)

SAMPLE
PAPER
Half Yearly Examination

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HALF YEARLY EXAMINATION
SAMPLE QUESTION PAPER

Class - VII Subject – English
Time – 3 Hours Maximum Marks- 80
General Instructions :
1. The question paper is divided into three sections :- A, B and C.
2. It is compulsory to attempt all the sections.
3. Hand writing carries marks.

Section – A (Reading)

I. Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions that follow:

WHAT WERE THE ARYANS IN INDIA LIKE ?

1. The Aryans must have come to India five or six thousand years ago or perhaps even more.
Of course they did not all come in a bunch. Army after army, tribe after tribe, family after
family, must have come for hundreds of years. Imagine them travelling in long caravans with
all their household goods laden on carts or on the backs of animals. They did not come as
tourists do nowadays. There was no going back for them. They came to stay, or fight and
die. Most of them, as I have told you, came over the mountains of the north-west. But
perhaps some came by sea also from the Persian Gulf and went in their little ships up the
river Indus.

2. What were these Aryans like? We can find out a lot about them from the books they wrote.
Some of these books like the Vedas, are perhaps the oldest books in the world. Probably
they were not written down to begin with. They were learnt by heart and recited and chanted
to others. They are written in such beautiful Sanskrit that you can almost sing them. Even
now it is a pleasure to hear a man with a good voice, who knows Sanskrit, recited the
Vedas. The Vedas are considered very holy books by Hindus. But what does the work
Vedas mean ? It means knowledge. And the Vedas contained the knowledge which the wise
men of those days, called rishis and munis, had gathered. They did not have railways,
telegraphs and cinemas in those days. But that does not mean that they were ignorant.
Some people think that the wise men of olden days were wiser than any today. But whether
they were wiser or not they wrote wonderful books which even today are greatly admired.
This itself shows how great these men of the olden days must have been.

3. As I have said, these Vedas were not at first written. They were remembered and were
handed down from generation to generation by word of mouth. They must have had

wonderful memories in those days. How many of us can learnt by heart whole books ?

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4. Those days when the Vedas were written are called the Vedic period. The first Veda is the
Rig Veda. It is full of hymns and songs which the old Aryans used to sing.They must have
been a very light-hearted people, not morose and gloomy but full of joy and adventure.
And in their joy they made beautiful songs and sang them to the gods they worshiped.

5. They werevery proud of themselves and their race. The very word ‘Arya’ meant a
gentleman, a superior kind of person. And they loved freedom greatly. They were not like
their descendants in India today who have little courage and hardly feel the loss of their
freedom. To the Aryans death was better than dishonour or slavery.

6. They were good fighters, and they knew something of science and a great deal of
agriculture. They naturally attached great value of agriculture and so they valued
everything that helped agriculture. The great rivers gave them water and they loved them
and looked upon them as great friends and benefactors. The bull and cow helped them
also very much both in agriculture and in their daily lives, for the cow gave milk which was
valued very greatly. So they specially cared for these animals and sang their praises. Long
afterwards, people, forgetting the real reason for the care of the cow, started worshipping
her as if that was any good to anybody.
Source: Letters from a Father to the Daughter – J.L. Nehru
Answer the following questions. [1x4]
(1) When did Aryans come to India?
(2) What do the books written by Aryans tell us?
(3) Why did Aryans value rivers, bulls and cows?
(4) What shows that the Aryans were great?
(5) Fill in the blanks. [1x2]
(a) The Aryans must had ____________memories in those days.
(b) Those days when the Vedas were written are called ____________ .
(6) What are the two important features of the Vedas? [1+1]
(7) Find a word from the passage which has the same meaning as the following. [1x2]
(a) one without knowledge (Para 2)
(b) bondage (Para 5)

II. Read the following poem carefully and answer the questions that follow: [1x10]

IMAGE
III.

On the door step of the temple
under the hot sun
I see her everyday.
Her hands and feet are
withered like limbs of a dead tree.

Her eyes tired of searching
for rays of hope
are sunk deep like caves
in a rock.

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Neither they receive light
nor give it.

Her three yard sari
has torn in thirty places.
Her body has absorbed
sixty years of dirt.
Her knotty matted hair
is the abode of work and ice.
Here and there some black teeth
stand as guards in her open mouth.
The lines on her face
like the crow’s feet.

Raising her shaking hands
with hope in her eyes
she looks at me
and an electric current
joins together our two hearts.
Time goes back fifteen years,
her face changes, her eyes twinkle !
When she smiles, her teeth dazzle !
In that one magic moment
I see the image of my dead mother.
Based on your understanding of the poem, complete the following paragraph.
The poet sees (1) ________ near the temple everyday. He compares her hands and feet to the
(2) ________ .Her eyes are sunk deep like caves. Her (3) ________ and (4) ________ reflect
her inability to maintain personal hygiene. Yet, when she raised her (5) ________ and looked at
the poet, he became nostalgic and thought of his dead mother.
(1) (a) her (b) him (c) them (d) their

(2) (a) branches of a tree (b) roots of a tree (c) limbs of a dead tree (d) flower

(3) (a) clothes (b) beautiful saree (c) top (d) shirt

(4) (a) eyes (b) hands (c) body (d) feelings

(5) (a) eyes (b) shaking hands (c) leg (d) feet

(6) Name the figure of speech used in the first stanza .
(7) What happened before fifteen years in poet’s life ?
(8) “Her eyes tired of searching for rays of hope”. Explain the line.
(9) Why does the image change in the last stanza ?

(10) Find a word in the poem which means ‘thick mass due to dirt’.

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Section – B(Writing and Grammar)
III. You are Amarjeet / Amrit, the Cultural Secretary of your school. You have been asked to
inform students of Class – VI – VIII about a Drama Competition in your School. Draft a
notice in about 50 words to be put up on the school notice board, with all necessary
detail. [5]
OR
Write a letter to your friend describing a wedding ceremony you have attended and how
you enjoyed yourself.

IV. India is a country of festival. Write a creative paragraph on the topic “The Scene at a
Market Place” during festivals. [5]
OR
A friend in need is a friend in deed.

V. Rewrite the given sentences using the correct form of the Verb given in the brackets.
[1x3]
(1) Which shirt he (wear) yesterday ?
(2) We (do) our shopping for the festival last week.
(3) My father (live) in Delhi but I stay here.

VI. Change the following into Passive Voice. [1x3]
(1) The Prime Minister will hoist the flag.
(2) My grandmother told me many stories.
(3) Shashi was writing a story.

VII. Identify whether the Verb is Transitive or Intransitive. [1x2]
(1) The children laughed cheerfully.
(2) The tailor stitched the dress.

VIII. Find out Direct object from the following sentences. [1x2]
(1) My father gifted me a car.
(2) Please don’t pluck the flowers.

IX. Correct the errors in the given sentences and rewrite with other necessary changes.
[1x3]
(1) She still needs some advices from the expert.
(2) The peoples in the country are hard working.
(3) I didn’t buy some fruits from the market.

X. Complete the sentences using appropriate Pronoun. [1x2]
(1) __________ is the house which belongs to Rishi.
(2) __________ does your father live ?
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XI. Do as directed: [1x10]
(1) What a smart man he was ! (Identify subject)
(2) The tourist angry and tired, asked the travel agent for a refund. (Identify predicate)
(3) Alas ! we lost the final match ! (Change it into assertive)
(4) our school band / which / had / the band / competed against / won many competition
(Arrange to form a meaningful sentence)
(5) His sense of ________ is quite amazing. (Write the abstract noun of humorous)
(6) This successful author belongs to a middle class family. (Identify gender of the
underlined)
(7) The man lives next to my house. The man is a famous politician. (Join the sentences with
a suitable relative pronoun)
(8) A ________ lamb lost its way. (Fill in the blank with adjective)
(9) This is best of all stories. (Identify error)
(10) I met my friend who is architect now. (Rewrite the sentence inserting Article were
missing)

Section – C (Literature)
XII. Answer the given questions with reference to the context. [1x10]
(A) “I sat for a while, frozen with horror, and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again
turned over the pages.”
(1) Why was the speaker in a state of despair ?
(2) What pages is he referring to ?
(3) What were the contents of the pages ?
(4) What does listlessness mean here ?
(5) Which mental condition of the speaker does the above line refer to ?
(B) “What though we toss at the fall of the sun
Where the hand of the sea – God drives ?
He who holds the storm by the hair,
Will hide in his breast our lives,”
(1) ‘We toss’, what does toss mean here ?
(2) Who is ‘he’ ?
(3) Whose lives does he hold ?
(4) What does the speaker mean by the last line of the stanza ? Explain in a sentence.
(5) What relation does the poet describe before these line ?
XIII. Answer (ANY FOUR) questions in 20 to 30 words. [2x4]
(1) Why were the family members satisfied with the name Attila ?
(2) What do you think is the wealth to the fisherman ?
(3) Why did Jerome decide to go to the doctor ?
(4) Why did grandmother not want to keep the Python at home ?

(5) Why did grandfather say that the Python is conceited ?

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XIV. Answer (ANY ONE)question in 50 to 60 words : [3]
Is it good to be your own doctor and self medicate by surfing net ? What are the dangers
involved in it ?
OR
Do you think the practice of ‘Snake Charming’ is right ? Give reason for your answer.

XV. Vocabulary : [1×4]

(1) I have given my car to a new mechanic for repair, hope he __________ . (Choose the
correct option)
(a) cut the ground from under feet.
(b) delivers the goods.
(2) The antonyms of abdicate is __________ .
(3) A man who waste money is called __________ .
(a) rough (b) squander (c) economic (d) unkempt
(4) Make a sentence using a word consistent to define the meaning of the word.

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