77 Fun Facts About 4th Grade

What is the capital city of California?

Sacramento took over in 1854 after lawmakers had already moved the government from San Jose to Vallejo to Benicia in California's first years.

Which city is the capital of Texas?

Austin: in 1842 President Sam Houston tried to move the archives away, but boarding-house keeper Angelina Eberly fired a cannon and townspeople took the records back.

Which city is the capital of Florida?

Tallahassee was picked as a halfway point because travel between Florida's two old capitals, St. Augustine and Pensacola, was so slow.

New York City is the biggest city in New York, but which city is the state capital?

Albany began as the Dutch trading post Fort Orange, and the English renamed it in 1664 after the Duke of Albany, the future James II.

Which is the largest US state by area?

Alaska was bought from Russia in 1867, and skeptics mocked the deal as 'Seward's Folly' until a gold rush in the 1890s showed its worth.

Which is the smallest US state by area?

Rhode Island is the smallest state, and in 2020 its voters dropped 'and Providence Plantations' from its long official name.

Which US state is made up entirely of islands?

Hawaii was an independent kingdom until 1893, when resident American and European businessmen overthrew its monarchy.

The Mississippi River flows south and empties into which body of water?

The Gulf of Mexico, which US federal agencies have called the Gulf of America since a January 2025 executive order.

Which mountains run along the eastern United States?

Appalachians: they probably once rose about as high as today's Rockies, before erosion wore them down to the lower peaks seen now.

Which Great Lake is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area?

Lake Superior, by the usual count: two of its neighbours, joined at a narrow strait, act as one lake that would be bigger still.

The Grand Canyon in Arizona was carved by which river?

The Colorado: in 1869 Civil War veteran John Wesley Powell led boats down the Green and Colorado rivers to explore the little-known canyon.

Mount Rushmore, carved with four presidents' faces, is in which state?

South Dakota: Mount Rushmore sculptor Gutzon Borglum died in March 1941, months before carving ended, so others put the finishing touches on the faces.

What do the US flag's stripes stand for?

Original colonies: when Vermont and Kentucky joined, the flag grew to 15 stripes, until an 1818 law cut it back to 13 for good.

What is the official US national motto?

In God We Trust: it first appeared on US coins during the Civil War, but Congress made it the national motto only in 1956.

Which president chose the White House site but left office before it opened?

George Washington chose the site with city planner Pierre L'Enfant, but construction dragged on for years, and John Adams became its first resident in 1800.

Which president issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863?

Abraham Lincoln's proclamation applied only to the rebelling Confederate states, so it left slavery untouched in loyal border states such as Kentucky.

Who was the main author of the Declaration of Independence?

Thomas Jefferson wrote the draft, but Congress struck out his long passage blaming King George III for the slave trade.

The Statue of Liberty was a gift to the United States from the people of which country?

France gave it, and its copper, brown like a penny when new, oxidized over the years into today's green.

In which city can you visit the Liberty Bell?

Philadelphia: the Liberty Bell cracked on its first test ring, so local metalworkers John Pass and John Stow melted it down and cast a new one.

Which bird is the national bird of the United States?

The bald eagle isn't bald at all: 'bald' once meant white-headed, and the bird is named for the white feathers on its head.

Which country's rulers sponsored Christopher Columbus's first voyage across the Atlantic?

Spain: Portugal turned his plan down before Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand backed it, and Columbus landed in the Bahamas sure he had reached the Indies.

Who was the first person to walk on the Moon?

Neil Armstrong: the computer was steering the lander toward a rocky crater, so he took manual control and flew it to a safer landing spot.

Rosa Parks became famous in 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a bus in which city?

Montgomery, Alabama: Parks was arrested there on December 1, 1955, and the bus boycott that followed lasted over a year, until the city's buses were desegregated.

Which famous speech did Martin Luther King Jr. give to a huge crowd in 1963?

"I Have a Dream": the famous dream passage wasn't in King's script; he improvised it after gospel singer Mahalia Jackson called out, "Tell 'em about the dream, Martin!"

What was the last name of the two brothers who made the first successful airplane flight in 1903?

Wright: when their gliders gave far less lift than the published figures predicted, Orville and Wilbur built their own wind tunnel to test wing shapes.

Which Founding Father invented the lightning rod?

Benjamin Franklin: he never patented his inventions, saying that since we enjoy great advantages from the inventions of others, we should share ours freely.

The Pilgrims sailed to America in 1620 aboard which ship?

The Mayflower was headed for northern Virginia, but rough seas forced it back to Cape Cod, so the passengers signed the Mayflower Compact to govern themselves.

Harriet Tubman helped about 70 people escape slavery along which network?

The Underground Railroad was not underground and had no trains; the name was code for the guides and safe houses that led escapees north, and Tubman made about 13 trips.

Which was the first national park in the United States?

Yellowstone: Yosemite Valley was protected earlier, in 1864, but Congress entrusted it to California to run, so Yellowstone in 1872 became the first national park.

Which planet is the farthest from the Sun?

Neptune: it was the first planet found by math, after astronomers worked out that an unseen world must be tugging on the orbit of Uranus.

Which is the largest planet in the Solar System?

Jupiter: its powerful gravity tore Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 into pieces, which later smashed into the planet one after another.

Which planet is nicknamed the Red Planet?

Mars is called the Red Planet because rusted iron in its surface dust gives it a reddish color; it has two small, lumpy moons, Phobos and Deimos.

Which planet is the smallest in the Solar System and closest to the Sun?

Mercury: despite being closest to the Sun, it isn't the hottest planet; Venus is, because its thick atmosphere traps heat.

Which planet is famous for its bright rings made mostly of ice?

Saturn: every giant planet has rings, but Saturn's icy rings are bright while the others' are faint and dark.

Earth is which planet from the Sun?

Third: that distance puts Earth in the Sun's habitable zone, where it's neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to stay on its surface.

What was Pluto officially reclassified as in 2006?

A dwarf planet: the 2005 discovery of Eris, a far-off world about the size of Pluto, pushed astronomers to finally define what counts as a planet.

What is the name of the galaxy that our Solar System is part of?

The Milky Way, our home galaxy, is named for the hazy band of light across the night sky, made of billions of stars too far away to pick out one by one.

How many chambers does the human heart have?

Four: before birth, a hole between the two upper chambers lets blood skip the unused lungs, and it usually closes once the baby starts breathing.

What gas do plants release into the air during photosynthesis?

Oxygen: surprisingly, the oxygen plants release comes from the water they split, not from the carbon dioxide they take in.

What is the chemical formula for water?

H2O: the H stands for hydrogen, a name built from Greek words meaning 'water-former', because burning hydrogen makes water.

How many degrees are in a right angle?

90: builders check that a corner is a true right angle by marking 3 units along one side and 4 along the other; if the gap between the marks is 5, it's square.

Which shape has six sides?

A hexagon: honeybees build comb from hexagonal wax cells, and hexagons fit together with no gaps while needing the least wall to enclose equal spaces.

What is an angle smaller than a right angle called?

Acute: a triangle's three angles always add up to 180 degrees, so every triangle must have at least two acute angles.

Which is the only even number that is also a prime number?

2 is prime because its only divisors are 1 and itself; every other even number is divisible by 2, so no other even number can be prime.

In a leap year, which month gets an extra day?

February: the extra day keeps the calendar in step with Earth's orbit, yet century years like 1900 skip it unless they divide evenly by 400.

Which is the largest animal that has ever lived on Earth?

The blue whale: the biggest animal known to have lived feeds almost entirely on krill, straining huge mouthfuls of seawater through its baleen plates.

Which is the fastest land animal?

The cheetah: its sprints burn so much energy that chases are usually over in under a minute, and it eats fast before lions or hyenas can steal the kill.

Which is the tallest animal living on land?

Giraffe: despite that long neck, it has just seven neck bones, the same number as a human; each one is simply very long.

Moths spin silk cocoons, but what is the hard case a butterfly caterpillar forms called?

A chrysalis: inside it, the caterpillar releases enzymes that dissolve most of its body into a soup, then rebuilds itself as a butterfly.

Which is the only mammal that can truly fly?

Bat: it flaps wings of thin membrane stretched over very long finger bones, while flying squirrels, sugar gliders and flying lemurs only glide.

Which is the largest and heaviest bird alive today?

The ostrich doesn't really bury its head in sand; it lays its head and neck flat on the ground, which from far off can look as if its head is buried.

Which animal appears alongside the emu on Australia's coat of arms?

Kangaroo: a newborn joey is only about the size of a bean, yet it climbs through its mother's fur into the pouch on its own.

Which is the largest species of bear?

Polar: it's usually ranked the largest bear, though big Kodiak brown bears come close, and under its white fur its skin is black.

Which bird can turn its head about 270 degrees because its eyes can't move in their sockets?

The owl: wide bony channels around its neck arteries and blood pools near its head keep its brain supplied while it twists.

Which is the smallest kind of bird in the world?

Hummingbird: it beats its wings so fast that it can hover at a flower to sip nectar and even fly backward.

Which of these sea animals is a mammal?

Dolphin: it breathes air, so it sleeps with only half its brain at a time, keeping the other half alert enough to surface for breaths.

Which is the largest and deepest ocean on Earth?

Pacific: Ferdinand Magellan named it the 'peaceful sea' because its waters seemed calmer than the stormy seas he had just crossed.

Which river is traditionally ranked the longest in the world?

The Nile: it's traditionally ranked longest, though some scientists who count the Amazon's estuary measure the Amazon as longer.

Which is the largest hot desert in the world?

The Sahara: several thousand years ago it was green, with lakes, grasslands and hippos, before its climate dried out.

Which continent has the South Pole?

Antarctica: for all its ice, it's actually a desert, because so little snow falls across most of the continent.

Which is the highest mountain on Earth above sea level?

Mount Everest: the air near its summit is so thin that most climbers rely on breathing tanks they carry up with them.

What is the imaginary line dividing the Northern and Southern Hemispheres called?

The equator: hurricanes almost never form near it, because the effect of Earth's spin that sets these storms rotating is too weak there.

Which of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World still stands?

Great Pyramid: built as a tomb for the pharaoh Khufu, it's by far the oldest of the seven wonders, yet it's the only one still largely intact.

Most of the Amazon rainforest is in which country?

Brazil: the forest's river got its name, the story goes, after explorer Francisco de Orellana's crew fought warrior women, like the Amazons of Greek myth.

The first person to survive a barrel plunge went over which falls?

Niagara Falls: Annie Edson Taylor took the 1901 plunge hoping to get rich, but she never earned much from it and died poor.

Which pilot became the first woman to fly solo nonstop across the Atlantic Ocean in 1932?

Amelia Earhart: battling icy conditions and mechanical problems, she ended the flight in a cow field near Londonderry, Northern Ireland.

Which type of animal is a frog?

An amphibian: the word comes from Greek for 'both kinds of life', since frogs start out as tadpoles in water and grow into air-breathing adults.

Which gas makes up about 78 percent of the air around us?

Nitrogen: most living things can't use it straight from the air, so nitrogen-fixing bacteria have to turn it into forms that plants can take up.

Which continent is the largest in the world by both land area and population?

Asia: for all its size, it shares one landmass with Europe, and the border between them is a historical and cultural choice rather than a physical one.

Which is the longest bone in the human body?

The femur, in the thigh: it grows longer at growth plates near its ends, and it stops growing once those plates harden into solid bone.

What is the largest organ of the human body?

The skin: its outer layer is mostly dead cells, which you shed all the time as new cells push up from below to replace them.

Which bird is the fastest animal on Earth when it dives for its prey?

Peregrine falcon: DDT thinned its eggshells until it vanished from much of its range, but a pesticide ban and captive breeding brought it back.

Which part of a plant takes in water from the soil?

Roots: but the main force lifting that water isn't the roots; water evaporating from the leaves pulls more water up through the stem behind it.

What kind of object is the Sun?

A star: it seems special to us, but it's an ordinary star, one of billions of stars like it scattered across our galaxy.

Which three colours are usually taught as the primary colours in art class?

Art classes teach red, yellow and blue as the primary colours of paint, mixed to make orange, green and purple; screens mix light using red, green and blue instead.

Which landmark is famously but wrongly said to be visible from the Moon?

Great Wall of China: its stone and clay blend into the land around it, and China's first astronaut, Yang Liwei, said he couldn't see it from space.

At what temperature does water freeze on the Celsius scale?

Water freezes at 0 °C, which is 32 degrees Fahrenheit; unusually, it expands as it turns to ice, which is why ice floats.