CBSE English Class 1 Syllabus 2026-27: NCERT Mridang, Learning Outcomes & Parent Guide
The CBSE Class 1 English syllabus is built on NCERT Mridang, which replaced the older Marigold reader under NEP 2020. Mridang has nine chapters in four units: My Family and Me, Life Around Us, Food, and Seasons. Most schools cover Units 1 and 2 in Term 1 and Units 3 and 4 in Term 2. By the end of the year a child is expected to read all 26 capital and small letters, decode simple CVC words like cat and pin, read sentences of 4 to 6 words with understanding, and recognise 50 to 80 common sight words.
There are no CBSE marks to chase in Class 1. Under the National Curriculum Framework for the Foundational Stage, adopted by CBSE circular on 17 March 2023, children are assessed by observation and recorded on a Holistic Progress Card as beginner, progressing or proficient. One gap matters most: Mridang does not teach systematic phonics, so ten minutes of daily letter-sound practice at home is the most useful thing to add.
- NCERT Mridang covers four themed units holding nine chapters, split across two terms, with the year-end goal that children read simple sentences and CVC words with understanding.
- The CBSE Class 1 curriculum does not teach systematic synthetic phonics — letter-sound teaching stays implicit in the textbook, which is the gap ZigZu is built to fill.
- A short daily phonics and read-aloud routine at home is the most impactful way to bridge the decoding gap that Mridang leaves implicit.
What does NCERT Mridang cover in Class 1?
Class 1 English is built around one NCERT reader, usually alongside a school workbook. Understanding what each is designed to do helps parents support the right skills at home.
Mridang (Main Reader)
Nine chapters in four units. A mix of rhymes, picture pages and short stories, instead of the fixed poem-and-story pair the old book used. Covers new words, understanding, basic grammar (action words, naming words, describing words) and simple writing. This is the book exams are set from.
Supplementary reader (school's choice)
NCERT has taken the old Raindrops reader off its website. Each school now picks its own extra reader, or library books at the right level. These are for reading practice. They are rarely marked, but they are what builds the reading habit.
School Workbook / Worksheet
Most CBSE schools supplement NCERT with a school-specific or published workbook (Oxford, Macmillan, etc.) that adds phonics, handwriting, and grammar exercises. The depth of phonics teaching varies significantly school by school.
Note for parents: NCERT textbooks are available free at ncert.nic.in. Download the Mridang PDF to preview all four units before the academic year starts — it is one of the most useful things a Class 1 parent can do.
What are the chapters in the four NCERT Mridang Class 1 units?
Mridang has nine chapters, grouped into four units by theme. The old Marigold reader gave every unit one poem and one story. Mridang does not. Each unit mixes rhymes to recite, picture pages to talk about, and short stories to read. Most schools teach Units 1 and 2 in Term 1, and Units 3 and 4 in Term 2.
Each unit's exercises cover: word meaning, comprehension questions, fill-in-the-blanks, match the following, naming words vs. action words, and simple writing tasks. The rhymes are used for recitation practice and identifying rhyming words, and the picture-reading spreads are used for oral description rather than written work.
How do Term 1 and Term 2 split the CBSE Class 1 syllabus?
| Term | Months | Mridang Units | Key skills focus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Term 1 | April – September | Units 1–2 (My Family and Me, Life Around Us) | Alphabet recognition and writing (capital + small letters), basic sight words, reading simple sentences aloud, poem recitation, naming words (nouns) vs action words (verbs). |
| Term 2 | October – March | Units 3–4 (Food, Seasons) | Reading short passages with comprehension, writing simple sentences on their own, describing words (adjectives), plurals, punctuation (capital letters and full stops), plus supplementary reading from the school's chosen reader. |
Where schools do run them, a Unit Test / Periodic Assessment usually falls every 6–8 weeks covering the most recent chapters, a Half-Yearly Examination (September) covers Units 1 and 2, and an Annual Examination (March) covers all four units. Reading aloud and recitation are assessed alongside written work. CBSE prescribes no split between the two for Class 1 — see how Class 1 English is assessed below for what the board actually requires.
What are the four-skill learning outcomes for CBSE Class 1 English?
CBSE's Learning Outcomes framework (NCERT, 2017) defines specific competencies expected by the end of Class 1 across four language skills. Here is what children should be able to do by March of Class 1:
| Skill | Expected by end of Class 1 |
|---|---|
| Listening |
Follows simple 2-step oral instructions in English. Understands short spoken stories and answers simple questions. Recognises rhyming words when heard aloud. Identifies beginning sounds of common words. |
| Speaking |
Recites rhymes from Mridang with appropriate rhythm and expression. Answers simple questions in complete sentences ("The dog is big"). Introduces themselves and names familiar objects in English. Retells a simple story in 3–4 sentences. |
| Reading |
Reads all 26 capital and small letters correctly. Reads simple CVC words (cat, pin, hot, run) by decoding. Reads simple sentences of 4–6 words with understanding. Reads passages from all four Mridang units with support. Recognises 50–80 high-frequency sight words automatically. |
| Writing |
Writes all 26 capital and small letters legibly. Writes simple CVC words correctly from dictation. Copies and writes simple sentences with correct spacing. Completes fill-in-the-blank and match-the-following exercises. Writes 2–3 sentences about a given picture or topic. |
The phonics gap in the CBSE Class 1 curriculum
This is the most important thing a CBSE Class 1 parent should understand about the English syllabus — and it is almost never discussed in school communications.
NCERT Mridang does not teach systematic phonics. The textbook exposes children to letters and words through poems and stories — but without the explicit, sequential teaching in letter-sound correspondences that reading research identifies as the most effective approach for building decoding skills. India's own National Education Policy 2020 clearly recommends phonics-based reading teaching for early grades — but NCERT textbooks have not yet been fully updated to reflect this.
What this means in practice: most Class 1 children in CBSE schools learn to recognise letters by name and memorise common words by sight — but they do not develop the systematic decoding ability to read an new word they have never seen before. When they encounter a new word, they guess (often from context or the first letter) rather than decode it sound by sound.
ASER's annual surveys confirm this at scale: the 2022 round found only 24.5% of Class 5 children in rural India could read a simple English sentence, barely changed from 24.7% in 2016, roughly the outcome four years after a child starts Class 1 if the phonics foundation is never built. The reading research base is clear about why: without systematic phonics, children reach an invisible ceiling where memorised words run out and decoding ability has not developed to take over.
What the gap looks like in a Class 1 child
- Can read "cat," "dog," "hen" (memorised from textbook) but not "vet," "log," or "pin" (same pattern, never seen)
- Guesses words from pictures rather than reading the text
- Reads haltingly even in Unit 1 by December — the memorised words are running out
- Can recite the ABC song perfectly but cannot blend /k/ /æ/ /t/ into "cat"
- Struggles with dictation because words were memorised visually, not phonically encoded
None of this is the child's fault or a sign of low ability. It is a structural gap in the curriculum that explicit phonics teaching at home can close — usually within 8–12 weeks of consistent daily practice.
What parents can do to supplement the CBSE syllabus at home
The goal is not to redo what school does — it is to add the phonics layer that school leaves implicit. Ten minutes a day is enough. Here is a practical weekly structure:
A simple weekly home routine
Phonics practice (10 min)
Follow the systematic phonics sequence: Group 1 (s,a,t,i,p,n) → Group 2 (c,k,e,h,r,m,d) → Group 3 (g,o,u,l,f,b) → CVC blending → digraphs. Use letter tiles, sand writing, or flashcards. Introduce 1–2 new sounds per week, review all previous sounds daily. This runs parallel to whatever Mridang chapter the child is studying in school and reinforces the same words from a phonics angle.
Sight word practice (10 min)
Target 5 new Dolch Pre-Primer or Primer words per week using sentence context (not bare flashcards). Review all previous words before introducing new ones. By mid-Class 1, children should recognise the 40 Pre-Primer words automatically — these are the exact words that appear most frequently in Mridang stories (the, is, a, I, and, in, on, to, it, big, red, can, go).
Read-aloud from Mridang or a storybook
Have the child read the current Mridang chapter aloud — not recite from memory, but actually track the words with their finger and read each word. This is different from how most children "practise" their textbook (memorisation and recitation). Finger-tracking while reading aloud builds the eye-voice connection that is the foundation of fluent reading. Follow up with 5 minutes of an easy storybook at the child's independent reading level.
Textbook comprehension prep (15 min)
Read the Mridang chapters for the upcoming unit aloud together 3–4 times in the week before the test. Ask comprehension questions orally: "Who are the characters? What happened first? Why did the character do that?" Oral comprehension practice is faster and more effective than written Q&A for building understanding — written answers in Class 1 are largely a transcription exercise, not a comprehension one.
How Class 1 English is assessed in CBSE schools
CBSE prescribes no mark scheme for Class 1. Under the framework it has formally adopted, it prescribes no marks at all. By circular dated 17 March 2023, CBSE adopted the National Curriculum Framework for the Foundational Stage (NCF-FS 2022) for all affiliated schools. The Foundational Stage runs from pre-school to Class 2, and the framework states that explicit tests and examinations are inappropriate assessment tools for children at this stage. It asks teachers to assess through observation of the child and the work the child produces, recorded in a Holistic Progress Card (HPC) that describes attainment in words. CBSE's own HPC for the Foundational Stage records a child as beginner, progressing or proficient rather than awarding a percentage.
In practice, many CBSE schools still run unit tests and term exams in Class 1. That is school policy, not board policy. The parts below are what those schools generally look at, but any weightage your school applies is its own — there is no national split to compare it against. If marks matter to you, ask your school for its scheme directly.
| Assessment part | What it looks at |
|---|---|
| Periodic Tests / Unit Tests | Current units: comprehension Q&A, fill-in-blanks, match the following, simple writing |
| Oral Assessment | Rhyme recitation, reading aloud from Mridang, oral Q&A |
| Notebook / Classwork | Handwriting, completion of exercises, neatness |
| Half-Yearly Exam | Units 1–5: reading comprehension, grammar, writing |
| Annual Exam | All 10 units: full syllabus reading, comprehension, writing |
The oral part matters more in Class 1 than in any later year. This is not about marks — it is about what a Class 1 child can actually show you. At this age, written output is limited by handwriting speed, not by understanding, so reading aloud and recitation are how a child shows most of what they know. A child who reads haltingly can appear weaker than they are, whichever way the school records it. Building read-aloud confidence at home, through daily storybook reading and poem recitation practice, is the most direct way to help.
The phonics layer your child's CBSE textbook doesn't provide
ZigZu is an AI-powered read-aloud coach that teaches systematic phonics through real storybooks — adding the letter-sound work that NCERT Mridang does not teach directly. As your child reads, ZigZu listens and gives real-time pronunciation feedback, helping them sound out new words correctly instead of guessing.
Designed for Indian children ages 4–8. Curriculum aligned with NEP 2020's phonics recommendation. Complements — not competes with — the CBSE Class 1 English syllabus.
Live on Android & iOS in India. Free to start — download today.
Frequently asked questions
The CBSE English Class 1 syllabus for 2026-27 uses NCERT Mridang. It replaced the older Marigold reader under NEP 2020. Mridang has nine chapters in four units: My Family and Me, Life Around Us, Food, and Seasons. It covers listening, speaking, reading and writing. It does not teach phonics step by step, so most children need letter-sound practice at home.
NCERT Mridang Class 1 has nine chapters across four units. Unit 1, My Family and Me, has Two Little Hands and Greetings. Unit 2, Life Around Us, has Picture Time, The Cap-seller and the Monkeys, and A Farm. Unit 3, Food, has Fun with Pictures and The Food we Eat. Unit 4, Seasons, has The Four Seasons and Anandi’s Rainbow.
CBSE Class 1 does not teach systematic phonics as a standalone part. The National Reading Panel (NRP, 2000) found explicit, sequential phonics teaching most effective for early reading. Mridang exposes children to letter sounds through poems and stories, but without this explicit sequence. NEP 2020 recommends phonics-based teaching, but CBSE implementation remains inconsistent. Parents who supplement should start with the s, a, t, i, p, n sequence alongside whatever unit their child studies.
The most effective preparation builds three skills: (1) Phonemic awareness — hearing individual sounds in spoken words through rhyming games; (2) Letter-sound knowledge — the sound each letter makes, starting with s, a, t, i, p, n; (3) Sight word recognition — 20–40 common words read automatically. A child entering Class 1 with these three skills will read on their own much sooner than peers who only know letter names.
By the end of CBSE Class 1, children are expected to write all 26 capital and small letters legibly, write simple CVC words correctly (cat, pin, run, hot), copy and write simple sentences of 4–6 words with correct spacing, and complete fill-in-the-blank exercises from the Mridang textbook. The main challenge for most Indian children is small-letter formation: b/d confusion, p/q confusion, and n/h distinction are the most common early writing errors.