NCERT Solutions for Class 6 English Poorvi Poem – The Winner by Georgia Heard (NCERT 2026–27)
Complete NCERT solutions for the Class 6 English Poorvi Unit 4 (Sports and Wellness) poem The Winner by Georgia Heard. This page gives the central idea, a line-by-line summary, all hard word meanings, poetic devices, and every exercise — Let us discuss, Let us think and reflect and Let us learn — answered in full, plus extra questions, MCQs, assertion–reason questions, exam tips and FAQs. Questions are reproduced word-for-word from the textbook; the answers are original and exam-ready.
- Poem Overview
- About the Poet
- Central Idea & Summary
- Word Meanings
- Poetic Devices
- Complete NCERT Exercise Solutions
- Extra Questions
- MCQs & Answer Key
- Assertion–Reason Questions
- FAQs
Poem Overview
“The Winner” is a short, free-verse poem that captures the simple joy of children playing outdoors in the evening. A group of friends plays ball in a neighbour’s field, next to a creek, running so fast that the speaker can hardly catch her breath. As the sky changes colour — from blue to dark to black — and the cold grass begins to ache their feet, the trees seem to “creep close” in the gathering darkness. At last the game has to stop because it is too dark to play. With a clever twist, the poet declares that “Night wins!” — the real winner of the day’s games is not any child, but the night itself, which ends the play. The poem celebrates the freedom and fun of unstructured outdoor play and gently reminds us that nature decides when playtime is over.
About the Poet – Georgia Heard
Georgia Heard is a well-known American poet, author and educator who writes especially for children. She is widely admired for her work on teaching poetry in schools and for books such as For the Good of the Earth and Sun and Awakening the Heart, which help young readers and teachers explore writing. Her own poems are often short, image-rich and rooted in everyday childhood experiences — playing outdoors, watching nature and noticing small moments. “The Winner” reflects her gift for using plain, musical language and a surprising final line to turn an ordinary evening of play into a memorable poem that children can easily relate to.
Central Idea & Summary
Central idea: The poem shows that the true joy of play lies in the activity itself, not in defeating an opponent. Through a group of children happily playing in a field until dark, the poet suggests that the only “winner” of the evening is Night — because nightfall, not a final score, is what brings the game to an end. It celebrates carefree outdoor play and the gentle power of nature.
Lines 1–4 (the setting): The poem opens in the evenings, when the children play ball next to a creek (a small stream) in their neighbour’s field. The image is of a familiar, open playground close to home where the friends gather to play after their day.
Lines 5–6 (the energy of play): The children “run so fast” that the speaker says she “can’t even catch my breath.” The words of this line are printed one below the other, stretched out on the page, which makes us feel just how breathless and tired the speaker has become from running.
Lines 7–10 (evening turns to night): As “blue dark turns to black”, the day is ending and night is falling. The “cold grass aches our feet” — the dew-cool grass makes their bare feet hurt. In the dim light the “trees creep close”, seeming to move nearer as the darkness hides them, and finally the “game’s over.”
Last line (the twist): The poet ends with the surprising line “Night wins!” Since darkness has forced the children to stop, it is Night — not any player — that is the real winner of the evening’s games.
Word Meanings (शब्दार्थ)
| Word | English Meaning | हिंदी अर्थ |
|---|---|---|
| creek | a small stream or narrow body of water | छोटी नदी, धारा |
| field | an open piece of land, often grassy | मैदान, खेत |
| neighbour | a person who lives close by | पड़ोसी |
| catch my breath | to rest and breathe normally after effort | साँस लेना, दम लेना |
| breath | air taken into and let out of the lungs | साँस |
| blue dark | the deep blue colour of the early-night sky | गहरा नीला अँधेरा |
| aches | causes a dull, continuous pain | दर्द करता है |
| creep | to move slowly and quietly | धीरे-धीरे सरकना |
| game’s over | the game has ended | खेल समाप्त |
| wins | defeats others; comes first | जीतता है |
| evenings | the time of day after the afternoon | शाम का समय |
| cold grass | grass made cool by the night air and dew | ठंडी घास |
Poetic Devices in the Poem
| Device | Explanation / Example from the poem |
|---|---|
| Free verse | The poem has no fixed rhyme scheme or regular metre; it flows like natural speech. |
| Personification | “trees creep close” gives the trees the human action of creeping; “Night wins!” makes night a living player who can win a game. |
| Visual layout / Spacing | “I / can’t / even / catch / my / breath.” is split word-by-word down the page to show the speaker gasping for breath. |
| Imagery | “next to the creek”, “blue dark turns to black”, “cold grass aches our feet” create vivid pictures of sight, touch and the fading evening. |
| Symbolism | “Night” stands for the natural force that ends play; “blue dark turns to black” symbolises the passing of time from evening to night. |
| Alliteration | The repeated ‘c’ sound in “can’t … catch” and “cold … creek/creep close”. |
Complete NCERT Exercise Solutions
Let us discuss
I. Read the given lines from the poem. Write the meaning of the lines by identifying the words/expressions in them.
| S.No. | Lines from the poem | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | next to the creek Clue: a small body of water | The children play beside a creek — a small stream of water — that runs through the field, so their playground is right next to flowing water. |
| 2. | I can’t even catch my breath Clue: the child has been running | The speaker has been running so fast and for so long that she is out of breath and cannot breathe normally again. |
| 3. | When blue dark turns to black Clue: the colour of the sky changes from blue to black | It means evening is turning into night. The deep-blue sky of the early evening is slowly becoming completely dark/black as night falls. |
| 4. | trees creep close Clue: it is evening time. Why do you think the trees seem close? | As darkness grows, the children can no longer see clearly, so the trees seem to move slowly nearer to them. The trees are not really moving; they only appear to “creep close” because the fading light blurs the distance. |
II. Read the poem. Complete the following based on the poem.
Let us think and reflect
I.1. Read the given lines and answer the questions that follow. “We run so fast / I / can’t / even / catch / my / breath.”
(i) Complete the sentence given below with the correct option. The speaker needs to catch her breath because ____________________________________. A. everyone decides to walk B. all the friends wish to go home C. running fast results in being breathless D. they need to do breathing exercises
(ii) Is the speaker alone? Why do you say so?
(iii) What does the pattern in the lines tell us?
I.2. Read the given lines and answer the questions that follow. “When blue dark turns to black, / cold grass aches our feet, / trees creep close— / game’s over. / Night wins!”
(i) Give one reason why the grass is cold.
(ii) Complete the sentence suitably. The children’s feet are aching because ____________________.
(iii) Why does ‘Night’ win? Night wins because the ___________________________. A. time for play has ended B. children are tired C. time to play at home begins D. night follows day
Let us learn
1. Read the information given in the table and see what the poet has done in the poem ‘The Winner’. Now, try to write some examples of your own for both. Use your imagination when creating these examples.
| Lines from the poem | What the poet has done | My own examples |
|---|---|---|
| I can’t even catch my breath | The words are spread out / repeated in a pattern to highlight that the children are really out of breath. | I am so s l e e p y that I can barely keep my eyes open. The waves go in… and out… and in… and out… |
| Night wins! | The poet has used human qualities for inanimate things (here, Night is shown as winning). This is called personification. | The wind whistled a happy tune through the trees. The angry sea threw its waves against the rocks. |
2. The poet has talked about a creek in the poem. You now know that creek is a water body. Complete the word web given below by writing which other water bodies you can think of. Discuss with your teacher.
The remaining tasks for this poem — Let us do these activities before we read (looking at the picture and discussing where/when you play), Let us listen (the four sport riddles — football, kabaddi, swimming and yoga/exercise), Let us speak (enacting parent–child roles) and Let us write (a paragraph about your own playtime) — are picture-based, listening, speaking and personal-writing activities meant to be done in class with your teacher, so they have no single fixed answer. Use the guided ideas below as a model and write/perform your own version.
Extra Questions with Answers
Short Answer Questions (30–40 words)
The children play in the evenings, in their neighbour’s field, on a spot right next to a small creek (stream). It is an open, grassy place close to their homes where they gather after their day. Q2. What game do the children play?
The children play ball. They run about very fast while playing, chasing and passing the ball with their friends until they are completely out of breath. Q3. Why does the speaker say she cannot catch her breath?
The speaker says she cannot catch her breath because she has been running so fast during the ball game. The hard running tires her out and leaves her panting and breathless. Q4. What makes the children finally stop playing?
Darkness makes them stop. When the blue evening sky turns black, it becomes too dark to see and play, and the cold grass hurts their feet, so the game is over and they go home. Q5. Why does the poet say “Night wins”?
The poet says “Night wins” because it is the falling of night, not any child, that ends the game. Since night brings the play to a stop, the poet playfully treats night as the true winner.
Long Answer Questions (100–120 words)
The poet uses simple but vivid images to show evening turning into night. The line “When blue dark turns to black” tells us that the deep-blue evening sky is slowly becoming fully dark, marking the passing of time. The “cold grass aches our feet” appeals to our sense of touch and shows that the warm day is gone and the cool night has arrived. The personification “trees creep close” makes the trees seem to move nearer as the fading light blurs everything around the children. Together these images let us almost see and feel the gathering darkness, until at last it is too dark to play and the “game’s over.” Q2. Explain the title ‘The Winner’. Why is it a surprising and clever title?
The title ‘The Winner’ makes us expect that one child, or one team, will win the ball game. But the poem never names any human winner; instead the children simply play happily until the light fails. The clever twist comes in the very last line — “Night wins!” The real “winner” is not a player at all but Night, because it is darkness that finally stops the game. The title is surprising because it gives a human quality (winning) to a part of nature, and it is clever because it gently teaches us that the joy of play is in the playing itself, while it is nature, not competition, that decides when play must end. Q3. What message about play and nature does the poem give to young readers?
The poem gives a warm, simple message about the pure joy of outdoor play. The children are not worried about scores, trophies or beating one another; they are happy just to run, play ball and spend the evening together with friends. Their fun continues for as long as the light allows. By making “Night” the winner, the poet reminds us that nature controls our time outdoors — daylight and darkness, warmth and cold all shape when we can play. The poem encourages children to enjoy active, carefree play in the open air and to notice and respect the changing world of nature around them, instead of focusing only on who wins or loses.
Multiple Choice Questions (MCQs)
1. Who is the poet of ‘The Winner’?
(a) Sudha Murty (b) Georgia Heard (c) Jean de La Fontaine (d) Jill Wolf
2. When do the children play in the poem?
(a) mornings (b) afternoons (c) evenings (d) nights
3. Where do the children play?
(a) in a park (b) in their neighbour’s field (c) on a playground (d) in the school ground
4. The children play next to a —
(a) river (b) lake (c) creek (d) pond
5. The word ‘creek’ means a —
(a) large ocean (b) small stream of water (c) tall tree (d) deep well
6. Why can the speaker not catch her breath?
(a) she is ill (b) she has been running fast (c) she is afraid (d) she is cold
7. ‘When blue dark turns to black’ shows that —
(a) it is early morning (b) evening is turning into night (c) it is raining (d) the sky is clear
8. ‘trees creep close’ is an example of —
(a) simile (b) personification (c) hyperbole (d) metaphor
9. Why does the cold grass ache the children’s feet?
(a) the grass is thorny (b) it is night and the grass is cold (c) the field is rocky (d) they wear no shoes for fun
10. According to the poem, who is the real ‘winner’?
(a) the speaker (b) the friends (c) Night (d) the neighbour
Assertion–Reason Questions
For each, choose: (a) Both A and R are true and R is the correct explanation of A. (b) Both A and R are true but R is NOT the correct explanation of A. (c) A is true but R is false. (d) A is false but R is true.
1. Assertion (A): The poem says “Night wins!”
Reason (R): The fall of night makes it too dark to play, so darkness ends the game.
Answer: (a) — R correctly explains why night is called the winner.
2. Assertion (A): The speaker is playing alone.
Reason (R): The poem uses words like “we” and “our feet”.
Answer: (d) — A is false (she plays with friends); R is true and actually proves she is not alone.
3. Assertion (A): “trees creep close” is an example of personification.
Reason (R): The trees are given the human action of creeping, though they do not really move.
Answer: (a) — R correctly explains the device.
4. Assertion (A): The children stop playing because it begins to rain.
Reason (R): The poem says “cold grass aches our feet”.
Answer: (d) — A is false (they stop because of darkness, not rain); R is true.
5. Assertion (A): The line “I can’t even catch my breath” is printed word by word down the page.
Reason (R): The broken pattern helps show that the speaker is panting and out of breath.
Answer: (a) — R correctly explains the purpose of the unusual layout.
📌 Exam Tips
• Remember the key images in order: evening play → running breathless → blue dark turns to black → cold grass aches feet → trees creep close → game’s over → Night wins.
• Be ready to explain the twist in the title: the “winner” is Night, not a child.
• Learn two devices to quote — personification (“trees creep close”, “Night wins!”) and the special word-by-word layout of “I can’t even catch my breath”.
• Use short quotations from the poem to support your answers and earn extra marks.
⚠ Common Mistakes to Avoid
• Do not write that one of the children wins the game — the poem says “Night wins!”
• Do not say the children stop playing because they are bored or it rains; they stop because it becomes too dark.
• A “creek” is a small stream, not a large sea or ocean.
• “trees creep close” does not mean the trees really move; it only seems so in the dim light — and it is personification, not a simile.
• Spell the poet’s name correctly: Georgia Heard.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Who wrote the poem ‘The Winner’ in Class 6 Poorvi?
The poem ‘The Winner’ was written by Georgia Heard, an American poet and educator who writes especially for children.
What is the central idea of the poem ‘The Winner’?
The poem shows children happily playing ball in a field until it gets dark. With a clever twist, the poet says “Night wins!” because nightfall — not any player — ends the game, celebrating the simple joy of outdoor play and the power of nature.
Why is the line ‘I can’t even catch my breath’ printed word by word?
The words are spread out one below the other to show the speaker panting and gasping for air. The broken pattern helps the reader feel how breathless and tired the children are after running so fast.