Introduction

Objects Around Us

We see a large number of objects around us. There are human beings, animals, birds and insects around us. We also have different types of plants and trees around us. The objects like table, chair, books, blackboard, chalk, paper, clothes, shoes, water, bicycle, football, toys, utensils, and sand are also around us. We can go on adding more and more objects to this list of objects which we can see around us. In fact, there is a large variety of objects around us. Some of these objects are natural (which occur in nature as such), whereas other objects are man-made (or artificial). All these objects are of different shapes, sizes and colours. They also have different properties. In order to understand objects around us, it is necessary to classify them into groups. We will now discuss how the various objects are classified.

The sorting of objects into groups with each group having its own characteristic properties, is called classification of objects. All the objects having similar characteristic properties are placed in one group during classification. And the objects having different properties are placed in different groups. For example, all types of soaps have similar characteristics, so all types of soaps are placed in one group at a shop. Similarly, all types of biscuits have similar characteristics, so all type of biscuits have also been placed together in one group. But the characteristics of soaps are different from those of biscuits, therefore, soaps and biscuits have been placed in different groups. We classify the objects because it given us the following advantages:

(i) The classification of objects into groups makes it easier to locate them and work with them.

(ii) The classification of objects into groups helps in understanding them. This is because if we know the properties of any one member of the group, we can get an idea of the properties of the other members of this group.