NCERT Solutions for Class 9th Social Science Chapter 1 Social Science in Everyday Life — LET'S ANALYSE
Book page 2 Updated on2026-09-08
Q1.
Observe your surroundings and identify a change that has taken place in your locality over the past five years. It could be related to transport, housing, education, technology, or the environment.
Answer
This is a field task, so the answer must be your own locality. Here is how to choose a change worth studying, what a good choice looks like, and a model you can adapt.
Method — how to choose:
Walk the same route you take every day and note what is not the way you remember it — a new road or bus route, a shop that closed, a pond filled in, a school building added, a mobile tower, piped water, street lights.
Pick one change, not five. A narrow question can actually be answered; a broad one cannot.
Check that you can find evidence for it. If nobody remembers the earlier situation and no photograph, record or newspaper cutting survives, choose a different change.
Fix the change in time. "Sometime recently" is not a finding; "the road was tarred in 2023" is.
What a good answer must contain: the change named exactly; the place named; the period stated; and at least two independent sources of evidence — for example an elder's account and a record or a photograph.
Sample answer: "Over the past five years the biggest change in our locality is that the unpaved lane connecting our colony to the main road has been tarred and street lights have been installed along it. The work was completed in 2023. I know this from three sources: my grandmother, who has lived here for forty years; a photograph on my father's phone dated June 2021 showing the lane still unpaved; and the notice board at the panchayat office, which lists the road work under that year's plan."
Q2.
What was the situation earlier?
Answer
Describe the earlier state as precisely as you would describe the present one — and say where each detail comes from. This is where a report becomes Social Science rather than opinion.
Method — where the evidence comes from:
People. Interview two or three long-time residents separately — an elder, a shopkeeper, a teacher, an anganwadi or ASHA worker. Ask about the same details each time.
Pictures. Old family photographs, phone galleries with dates, school function albums.
Records. Panchayat or municipal notice boards and minutes, school registers, shop account books, ration or electricity bills, old newspapers.
The place itself. Traces of the earlier state survive on the ground — an old well, a filled-in tank, the stump of a felled tree, the older half of a building.
Why it matters: Memory is a source, not a fact. Two people who lived through the same years will remember different things, and both may be honest. The chapter's own description of the method is exactly this — social scientists "conduct interviews and surveys, examine documents, and compare different times and places", and by gathering information from multiple sources build explanations that are supported by evidence. So write "three residents said…" rather than "it was…", and check each claim against a second source.
Sample answer: "Before 2023 the lane was a dirt track about three metres wide. All three residents I interviewed agreed that it turned to slush during the monsoon and that autos refused to enter the colony in July and August. The 2021 photograph confirms the unpaved surface. There were no street lights: my grandmother said people carried torches after dark, and there are no old poles anywhere along the lane."
Q3.
What has changed?
Answer
State the difference between then and now in countable, checkable terms. A comparison table is the clearest way to set it out.
What a good answer must contain: the same set of features described for both dates, so that the two columns can genuinely be compared; and a date attached to the change.
Feature
Earlier (up to 2022)
Now (2025)
Road surface
Unpaved dirt track, about 3 m wide
Tarred road, about 4 m wide
Monsoon access
Slushy; autos would not enter
Usable through the year
Lighting
None
Street lights along the lane
Shops on the lane
2
5
Time to the bus stop
About 15 minutes on foot
About 8 minutes on foot
Tip: Count something. "The lane looks better" is an impression. "Two shops became five, and the walk to the bus stop fell from about fifteen minutes to about eight" is a finding another student could go out and check — and being checkable is what makes it evidence.
Q4.
What might have caused this change?
Answer
Notice the wording of the question — "might have". Here you move from what you observed to what you conclude, and the two must never be mixed up.
Method: list every cause that could plausibly explain the change, then test each one against evidence and keep the ones that survive.
A decision. A government scheme, a panchayat or municipal resolution, a budget allotment. Look for a notice, a minute, a signboard naming the scheme.
A demand. A residents' petition, repeated complaints, an election promise. Ask who first raised it.
A slower background cause. More families moving in, more two-wheelers, a new school or factory nearby, rising incomes.
A trigger. An accident, a flood, an epidemic, a visit by an official.
The chapter's own method, in four steps: observe and ask, compare across time and place, explain from the evidence, and stay ready to revise.
Source and interpretation are not the same thing. The 2021 photograph is a source — it shows an unpaved lane on a particular day. "The road was tarred because the colony petitioned the panchayat" is an interpretation — a claim you have built from sources. A source can be described; an interpretation must be argued for, and can be overturned by evidence you have not yet seen. Always keep them in separate sentences in your report.
Sample answer: "Two causes are likely. First, a decision: the panchayat notice board lists this lane under the 2022–23 road works, so the money and the sanction can be documented. Second, a demand behind that decision: two residents said the colony had submitted written complaints after a scooter accident in the monsoon of 2021. The first cause is supported by a written record. The second rests only on what two people told me, so I record it as probable rather than proved — I could confirm it by asking to see the panchayat's file of complaints."
Q5.
How has it affected people’s lives?
Answer
Answer group by group. A change almost never affects everyone in the same way, and saying who gained and who lost is the most useful part of your report.
What a good answer must contain: effects on at least three different groups; gains and costs; and a distinction between what people told you they felt and what you could measure.
Group
Effect
Gain or cost
Schoolchildren
Reach the bus stop in about 8 minutes instead of 15; fewer days missed in the monsoon
Gain
Women and elderly residents
Street lights make it possible to go out after dark; safer footing in the rain
Gain
Shopkeepers
Two shops became five; deliveries by tempo now possible
Gain
Households on the lane
More vehicles, faster traffic, more noise and dust
Cost
Vegetable sellers who used the verge
Lost the space they sat on when the road was widened
Cost
Why it matters: The chapter says Social Science helps us understand how systems "affect different groups of people". Reporting only the gains would not be a milder answer — it would be an inaccurate one, because it leaves out the people whose situation got worse.
Q6.
Prepare a short report and present it in class.
Answer
Build the report on the four questions you have just answered, and keep evidence and conclusion visibly apart.
Structure — about one to two pages:
Title and place. The change, the locality, the period studied. Example: "Tarring of the colony lane, Ward 7, 2022–2025".
How I found out. Whom you interviewed and when, which records you saw, which photographs you used. Number your sources so you can refer to them later.
The earlier situation. Described feature by feature, each with its source.
What has changed. The before-and-after table.
Likely causes. Each cause with the evidence for it, and a clear note where the evidence is thin.
Effects on different groups. Gains and costs, group by group.
What I could not establish. One honest paragraph. This strengthens a report; it does not weaken it.
For the presentation: open with the one-sentence finding, show the before-and-after table or the two photographs, give the strongest piece of evidence for your explanation, and end with the question you could not settle. Five minutes is enough. Thank the residents who spoke to you, and do not use anyone's name if they asked you not to.
Sample opening line: "Between 2022 and 2023 the lane connecting our colony to the main road was tarred and lit. Walking time to the bus stop fell from about fifteen minutes to about eight, three new shops opened — and the two vegetable sellers who used to sit on the verge no longer have a place."
This is a field task, so the answer must be your own locality. Here is how to choose a change worth studying, what a good choice looks like, and a model you can adapt.
Method — how to choose:
What a good answer must contain: the change named exactly; the place named; the period stated; and at least two independent sources of evidence — for example an elder's account and a record or a photograph.
Describe the earlier state as precisely as you would describe the present one — and say where each detail comes from. This is where a report becomes Social Science rather than opinion.
Method — where the evidence comes from:
State the difference between then and now in countable, checkable terms. A comparison table is the clearest way to set it out.
What a good answer must contain: the same set of features described for both dates, so that the two columns can genuinely be compared; and a date attached to the change.
Notice the wording of the question — "might have". Here you move from what you observed to what you conclude, and the two must never be mixed up.
Method: list every cause that could plausibly explain the change, then test each one against evidence and keep the ones that survive.
Answer group by group. A change almost never affects everyone in the same way, and saying who gained and who lost is the most useful part of your report.
What a good answer must contain: effects on at least three different groups; gains and costs; and a distinction between what people told you they felt and what you could measure.
Build the report on the four questions you have just answered, and keep evidence and conclusion visibly apart.
Structure — about one to two pages:
For the presentation: open with the one-sentence finding, show the before-and-after table or the two photographs, give the strongest piece of evidence for your explanation, and end with the question you could not settle. Five minutes is enough. Thank the residents who spoke to you, and do not use anyone's name if they asked you not to.