80 Fun Facts About 4th Grade

What is the capital city of California?

Sacramento is much smaller than Los Angeles, but it has been the seat of California's government since 1854.

Which city is the capital of Texas?

Houston, Dallas and San Antonio are all bigger, but the state government sits in Austin.

Which city is the capital of Florida?

Tallahassee sits in the Florida Panhandle and became the capital in 1824, long before Miami or Orlando were big cities.

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

Albany is the oldest city in the state and sits on the Hudson River about 150 miles north of New York City.

Which is the largest US state by area?

It is bigger than Texas, California and Montana put together, and its capital, Juneau, cannot be reached by road.

Which is the smallest US state by area?

Even though it is tiny, it is one of the most crowded states, second only to New Jersey in population density.

Which US state is made up entirely of islands?

The state has 137 volcanic islands; the eight main ones include Oahu, Maui and the Big Island the state is named after.

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

It starts at Lake Itasca in Minnesota and runs 2,340 miles before it reaches the sea near New Orleans.

How many Great Lakes are there?

Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie and Ontario are so big and stormy they are sometimes called inland seas.

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

Only Lake Baikal in Siberia and Lake Tanganyika in Africa hold more water, because they are far deeper.

The Grand Canyon in Arizona was carved by which river?

The river cut down through layer after layer of rock, exposing nearly two billion years of Earth's history in the canyon walls.

Denali, the highest mountain in North America, is in which state?

Its summit is 20,310 feet above sea level, and it is also officially known as Mount McKinley.

How many stripes are on the flag of the United States?

The stripes stand for the original colonies that won independence from Britain, while the 50 stars stand for today's states.

Which city is the capital of the whole United States?

It is not part of any state; it is a special federal district named after the first president.

Who was the first president of the United States?

He served from 1789 to 1797 and lived at Mount Vernon in Virginia, where he grew tobacco and wheat.

Which president issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863?

The 16th president declared enslaved people in the rebelling states free during the middle of the Civil War.

Who was the main author of the Declaration of Independence?

He later became the third president, and he died on July 4, 1826, exactly 50 years after the Declaration was adopted.

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

It was built in Paris, shipped across the ocean in crates, and put together on an island in New York Harbor; its frame was made by Gustave Eiffel.

In which city can you visit the Liberty Bell?

The bell cracked the very first time it was rung after arriving, and it was recast twice by local workmen John Pass and John Stow.

Which bird is the national bird of the United States?

It appears on the Great Seal, coins and stamps, and it is not really bald; its head is covered in white feathers.

In what year did Christopher Columbus first sail across the Atlantic and reach the Americas?

He left Spain in August with three ships and made landfall on October 12, believing he had reached Asia.

Who was the first person to walk on the Moon?

He commanded Apollo 11 in July 1969, and Michael Collins stayed in orbit around the Moon while the other two astronauts went down to the surface.

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

Her arrest sparked a bus boycott that lasted more than a year and helped launch the civil rights movement.

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

The speech lasted about 17 minutes, and the next year King won the Nobel Peace Prize.

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

Orville and Wilbur flew their Wright Flyer near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on December 17, 1903.

Which Founding Father invented the lightning rod and bifocal glasses?

He also invented a heating stove that is still named after him, and he never patented any of his inventions.

The Pilgrims sailed to America in 1620 aboard which ship?

About 102 passengers spent ten weeks at sea before dropping anchor near the tip of Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Harriet Tubman helped about 70 people escape slavery via which network of safe houses?

It was not underground and had no trains; the name was a code for the people and hiding places along the route north.

Which was the first national park in the United States?

It was created in 1872 and is famous for the Old Faithful geyser, which erupts every hour or two.

How many planets are in our Solar System?

Pluto used to be counted as the ninth planet until astronomers reclassified it as a dwarf planet in 2006.

Which is the largest planet in the Solar System?

It is so big that 1,321 Earths could fit inside it, and its Great Red Spot is a storm that has been raging since at least 1831.

Which planet is nicknamed the Red Planet?

It has two small, lumpy moons named Phobos and Deimos.

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

Because it is so close to the Sun, it is on average the closest planet to Earth as well.

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

It is the sixth planet from the Sun and has at least 293 known moons.

Earth is which planet from the Sun?

It is the only place in the universe known to have life, and it takes about 365 and a quarter days to go once around the Sun.

What was Pluto officially reclassified as in 2006?

It lives in the Kuiper belt, a ring of icy bodies beyond Neptune, and is smaller than Earth's Moon.

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

It is named for the hazy band of light you can see across the night sky, made of stars too far away to pick out one by one.

About how many bones does an adult human have?

Babies are born with around 270 bones, but many of them fuse together as a child grows.

How many chambers does the human heart have?

The two upper chambers are called atria and the two lower ones are ventricles; a resting adult heart beats about 72 times a minute.

What gas do plants release into the air during photosynthesis?

Plants take in carbon dioxide and water, use sunlight to make sugar, and give off this gas that we need to breathe.

What is the chemical formula for water?

Each molecule has two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom, and water is the only common substance found naturally as a solid, a liquid and a gas.

How many degrees are in a right angle?

It is a quarter of a full turn, and it is the angle you find in the corner of a square or a sheet of paper.

How many sides does a hexagon have?

The name comes from the Greek word for six; honeybees build their honeycomb out of this shape.

A stop sign is shaped like an octagon. How many sides does it have?

The name comes from the Ancient Greek for 'eight angles'.

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

Every other even number can be split into 2 times something, so every other prime is odd.

How many items are in a dozen?

The word is often shortened to 'doz' or 'dz' on egg cartons and price tags.

How many days are in a leap year?

The extra day is added to February every four years to keep the calendar lined up with Earth's trip around the Sun.

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

It can reach 100 feet long and weigh around 200 tons, far bigger than any dinosaur.

Which is the fastest land animal?

It can run around 60 miles per hour thanks to its long legs and bendy spine, and it can catch antelope even with a big head start.

Which is the tallest animal living on land?

It is also the largest ruminant, an animal that chews its cud like a cow.

A caterpillar turns into a butterfly inside a hard case called what?

Butterflies go through four life stages: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis and winged adult.

How many legs does an insect have?

Insects also have a three-part body made of a head, thorax and abdomen; spiders have eight legs, so they are not insects.

Which is the only mammal that can truly fly?

Flying squirrels only glide; these animals flap wings made of skin stretched between very long fingers.

Which is the largest and heaviest bird alive today?

It cannot fly, but it can run 43 miles per hour, and it lays the biggest eggs of any land animal.

Which animal carries its baby, called a joey, in a pouch and is native to Australia?

It is a marsupial from a group called macropods, which means 'large foot'.

Which is the largest species of bear?

Under its white fur, its skin is actually black, and a big male can weigh over 1,700 pounds.

How far can an owl turn its head?

Owls have to twist their necks that far because their eyes are fixed in their sockets and cannot move on their own.

Which is the smallest kind of bird in the world?

The tiniest species, the bee hummingbird, is about two inches long and weighs less than a penny.

Which of these is a mammal, not a fish?

Like whales, these animals breathe air, have blubber to keep warm and use echolocation clicks to find their way.

Which is the largest and deepest ocean on Earth?

It covers more of the planet than all the land on Earth put together.

Which is the longest river in the world?

It runs about 4,400 miles through northeastern Africa, though the Amazon carries far more water.

Which is the largest hot desert in the world?

It stretches across northern Africa and is about the size of the United States; only the icy deserts of Antarctica and the Arctic are bigger.

Which continent has the South Pole?

It is the coldest and least populated continent, and it has no permanent residents, only visiting scientists.

Which is the highest mountain on Earth above sea level?

It sits on the border of Nepal and Tibet, where locals call it Sagarmatha and Qomolangma.

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

It is the line of zero degrees latitude, and countries on it like Ecuador and Kenya are warm all year round.

The Great Pyramid of Giza was built as a tomb for which Egyptian pharaoh?

It is the oldest of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World and the only one still mostly standing.

Most of the Amazon rainforest is in which country?

About 60 percent of the forest lies in that one country, and the whole rainforest holds an estimated 390 billion trees.

Niagara Falls sits on the border between New York and which country?

It is actually three waterfalls; the biggest one, Horseshoe Falls, straddles the border itself.

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

She had crossed as a passenger four years earlier, and she disappeared over the Pacific in 1937 while trying to fly around the world.

Which type of animal is a frog?

Frogs make up nearly 90 percent of all amphibian species; their scientific order name, Anura, means 'without tail'.

What share of Earth's atmosphere is made up of the gas humans need to breathe?

Most of the air is actually nitrogen; the oxygen we rely on was made by plants and other organisms through photosynthesis.

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

Asia covers about 30 percent of all the land on Earth and is home to more than half of the world's people.

Which is the longest bone in the human body?

The femur is also the thickest bone, and its length is about a quarter of a person's height.

What is the largest organ of the human body?

Skin makes up roughly 16 percent of your body mass and covers about 1.5 to 2 square metres on an adult.

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

In its hunting stoop the falcon can top 320 km/h, faster than any cheetah on the ground.

How many legs does a spider have?

Each spider leg has seven parts, and spiders are arachnids rather than insects, which have six legs.

What kind of object is the Sun?

It is a giant ball of hot plasma powered by nuclear fusion, and it sits at the centre of our Solar System.

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

Screens like TVs mix light differently, using red, green and blue as their primaries instead.

Roughly how long is the Great Wall of China, counting all of its sections?

Despite the famous myth, the wall cannot be seen with the naked eye from the Moon.

At what temperature does water freeze on the Celsius scale?

That is 32 degrees Fahrenheit; unusually, water expands as it turns to ice, which is why ice floats.