The House-builder workshop class 8th

The House-builder workshop standard 8th

The house builder

This is a story of a mason, who worked for a 

building contractor. The mason always strove to do his 

work to perfection. 

As soon as a house had been designed by the 

architect and details finalized by the engineer, the 

contractor would send for the mason and leave the 

responsibility of building the house to him. The mason 

would then, without wasting any time start his work. 

He would take great interest in his work of building 

and do it with full dedication. He made sure that he 

used the best construction material, of high quality, the 

measurements of the walls, doorways, arches etc. were 

perfect and he gave an excellent and appealing finish 

to whatever he built. The owners of the new houses 

built, would be more than satisfied with the construction.

Because of the zeal, diligence, loyalty and 

persistence that he displayed in his work, the mason 

was in great demand and fetched good business to his 

contractor. Subsequently the contractor, recompensed

the mason, handsomely, with a very good salary. He 

could meet the needs of his family sufficiently, without 

any scarcity.

The mason thus continued working with great 

devotion for many years, till he became a grandfather. 

Then he decided that it was time to retire and spend 

time playing with his grandchildren. Being a firm-

minded person, he informed his contractor of his decision 

to retire from house-building. The contractor was very 

disheartened to lose such an excellent workman and 

urged the mason to continue his job, but to no avail. 

The mason had made up his mind and refused to carry 

on. 

Finally, the contractor convinced the mason to build 

one last house on a beautiful and convenient site, as 

a special favour. The mason agreed to do so with great 

reluctance, not too happily either.

The construction started. It was a most beautifully 

designed house to be built at a sought-after location. 

However, the mason could not put his mind and heart 

in his work. He did his work very roughly and carelessly, without interest or dedication. Even the 

building material used was of low quality; but he did 

not care. He simply wanted to complete the job in 

haste and finally retire.

The house was ready earlier than expected – very 

roughly made structures, weak walls, poor finish and 

did not look as good at all, as designed. Yet the mason 

did not care. He informed the contractor that the house 

was ready and he was waiting to hand over its keys 

to him.

The contractor arrived at the site. He had a file of 

legal documents in his hand. The mason handed over 

the new house’s keys to him. But the contractor did 

not step forward to enter the house, to see it. Instead, 

with a broad smile, he handed over the file along with 

the house-keys to the mason and said beaming happy 

tone, “These are the ownership documents of this new 

house in your name. The house is yours. I had planned 

it as a gift for you.”

Workshop

The House-builder workshop standard 8th

English workshop of The builder class 8

1. Find from the story the Noun forms of the following.

(1) dedicate :            (5) own : 

(2) measure :            (6) give : 

(3) decide :               (7) responsible : 

(4) perfect :             (8) persist : 

2. Choose the proper phrase / expression to complete the sentences meaningfully.

(to send for, with full dedication, in great demand, to meet the needs of, make up 

one’s mind, to no avail, to hand over)

(1) She does her job .

(2) One should to help others, when needed.

(3) As Mr. Jadhav was transferred to Chennai he had his 

responsibilities to his assistant.

(4) The labourer’s income was not sufficient his family.

(5) Because of a fault in the wiring, they will have an electrician.

(6) Mother tried hard to change her son’s habits, but .

(7) Mangoes from Ratnagiri are always

3. Read the story and answer in your words.

(a) The owners of the new houses built by the mason would be extremely 

pleased. WHY?

(b) The contractor compensated for the mason’s good work. HOW?

(c) The mason made a firm decision to retire. WHEN? 

One syllabic Two syllabic Three syllabic More than three 

syllabic

4. Read the following words from the story aloud and fill them in the 

proper columns.

(story, work, perfection, architect, leave, building, full, door, way, quality, responsibility, 

measurement, great, many, avail, excellent, material, complete, sufficiently, ready, 

documents, broad, happy, ownership, subsequently.)

One syllabic
Two syllabic
Three syllabic
More than three syllabic

5. (A) Words that have the same sound / pronunciation, but differ in spellings
and meanings are called Homophones. For example : hair - hare
 Pick out from the lesson Homophones of the following words :
(1) waist
 (2) knew
 (3) lose
 (4) maid
 (5) grate
(6) won
 (7) sight
 (8) week
 (9) would
 (10) sea
(B) Select any three pairs of homophones from above and make simple
 sentences of your own to show the difference in their meaning.
 (1) (i)
 (ii)
 (2) (i)
 (ii)
 (3) (i)
 (ii)

6. ‘Always do your best. What you plant now, you will harvest later’.
Write a paragraph on the above topic with an interesting example of the same.