45 Fun Facts About Children's Day

Which affectionate title did Indian children give their first prime minister, whose birthday became Children's Day?

Chacha (Uncle) Nehru's birthday was chosen in recognition of his work for children's welfare and education.

The UN adopted its 1959 Declaration and 1989 Convention on children's rights on which date, now World Children's Day?

The 1954 UN resolution that created Universal Children's Day left each country to pick its own date; 20 November stuck because the 1959 Declaration and the 1989 Convention were both adopted on it.

Which country's Día del Niño, on 30 April, has radio and TV hosts bring their children onto their shows?

Mexico fixed 30 April in the 1920s under President Álvaro Obregón, steering clear of 1 May's Labour Day and Cinco de Mayo, while the UN's own date clashes with Revolution Day.

Children's Day began in the 1850s as 'Rose Day' at Charles Leonard's Universalist church in Chelsea, in which US state?

Massachusetts pastor Charles Leonard called his service Rose Day, later Flower Sunday; in 1867 the Universalist Convention urged every church to set aside one Sunday a year for children.

Eglantyne Jebb, who drafted the 1924 Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child, had founded which charity in 1919?

Save the Children was launched in London in 1919 to feed children in Central Europe who were still going hungry under the Allied blockade after the Armistice.

Norway's Children's Day on 17 May shares its date with which national celebration, known for children's parades?

Constitution Day in Norway is marked by children's parades rather than military ones, a tradition launched in the capital on the initiative of the writer Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson.

Kashiwa mochi eaten on Japan's Children's Day comes wrapped in which tree's leaf, which stays on until new leaves grow?

Oak leaves are not eaten, unlike the cherry leaf on sakura mochi; the tree's habit of keeping old leaves until new ones appear makes it a charm for prosperity of offspring.

UNICEF, the agency behind World Children's Day, began in 1946 with which word behind the 'E' in its name?

Emergency was in the name because UNICEF began as a temporary fund to feed and clothe children after the Second World War; it dropped the word in 1953 but kept the acronym.

Which country, the first to make Children's Day a holiday, lets children sit in for its president and ministers?

Turkey's children send representatives into the offices of the president, cabinet ministers, governors and mayors every 23 April, and since 1979 the festival has flown in children from abroad.

Which South Asian product does the child-labour-free label founded by 2014 Nobel laureate Kailash Satyarthi certify?

Rugs can carry the label only if their makers pass inspection; Kailash Satyarthi founded the scheme in 1994 as Rugmark, and it was later renamed GoodWeave.

Which teenage campaigner addressed the UN on her 16th birthday, 12 July 2013, a date it then named after her?

Malala Yousafzai was making her first public appearance since a Taliban gunman shot her nine months earlier, and used the speech to call for schooling for every child.

Congo, Gabon, Chad and the Central African Republic mark Children's Day on which date, already a major Christian feast?

25 December doubles as Children's Day across much of Central Africa, while Eritrea keeps 8 December and Tunisia has marked 11 January since 1995.

Japanese families displaying hina dolls for Girls' Day traditionally pack them away fast to spare a daughter which fate?

A late marriage is the superstition for dolls left out past the day after Hinamatsuri; in an older custom, dolls were set adrift on rivers to carry misfortune away.

Which country's Children's Day, on the second Saturday of January, lets children sit at the prime minister's desk?

Thailand's 'Wan Dek', held since 1955, comes with a theme and slogan from the prime minister, and Government House, Parliament and military bases open their doors to families.

The World Day Against Child Labour, marked every 12 June since 2002, was launched by which UN agency?

The ILO (International Labour Organization) launched the day in 2002; four years earlier the Global March Against Child Labour had ended at its Geneva conference, pressing for a treaty on the worst forms of child labour.

Argentina moved its Children's Day from the second to the third Sunday of August in 2013 to stop it clashing with what?

Primary elections took over the second Sunday of August in 2013, so the day, when children traditionally receive toys, moved back a week and has stayed on the third Sunday since.

The UK holds its National Children's Day in summer rather than on the UN's date, for what stated reason?

So they can be outdoors: the UN left each country to pick its own date, and the UK organisers wanted children out in their neighbourhoods and in nature, so they chose the start of summer.

Which country's 2025 presidential decree moved its Children's Day from 1 June to the UN's World Children's Day date?

Ukraine's decree gave its reasons: to make protecting childhood a priority for the whole country and to unite with efforts worldwide for children's rights, in line with the UN convention.

Japan's 1948 holiday law, which turned Boys' Day into Children's Day, also says the day expresses gratitude toward whom?

Mothers get the thanks in the law's wording, while the old Boys' Day customs of armour displays, samurai dolls and streamers were opened to girls as well.

Kintarō dolls shown on Japan's Children's Day honour a folk hero said to have beaten which animals at sumo as a boy?

Bears lost to the 'Golden Boy', thought to be based on a real Heian-period retainer, Sakata Kintoki; families put up his doll in the hope that their sons grow up as brave and strong.

Which flower gives its English name to shōbu-yu, the bath of sword-shaped leaves taken on Japan's Children's Day?

Iris is the usual English name, though the bath plant is strictly sweet flag; samurai prized it for its blade-like leaves and because shōbu also sounds like a word for martial spirit.

Brazil's Dia das Crianças on 12 October shares its date with the feast of which patron saint of the country?

Our Lady of Aparecida's feast is the patron-saint holiday that gives 12 October its day off, and Brazilian children mark it by receiving presents from parents and relatives.

Which West African country's Children's Day, a 27 May school holiday since 1964, has selected schools parade?

Nigeria is so large that only a few selected schools get to parade; other pupils spend the day on outings or doing the jobs adults normally do.

New Zealand's Children's Day, on the first Sunday in March, honours children with which Māori word for 'treasure'?

Taonga is the word, and in 2012 the day's theme turned to peace and aroha, the Māori word for love.

In April 1919, Eglantyne Jebb was arrested in Trafalgar Square for distributing leaflets carrying what?

Famine photographs of starving children filled the leaflets; she was fined £5, but the prosecutor was so impressed by her that he offered to pay the fine himself.

As of 2025, which UN member alone remains outside the Convention on the Rights of the Child, having signed it in 1995?

The United States helped draft the treaty and signed it in 1995 but has never ratified it, leaving it alone among UN members outside the convention.

The UN's Day of the Girl Child, first held in 2012, grew from which NGO's 'Because I Am a Girl' campaign?

Plan International took the idea to the Canadian government, whose status-of-women minister Rona Ambrose sponsored the UN resolution that passed in late 2011.

The Day of the African Child marks 16 June 1976, when police fired on marching pupils in which South African township?

Soweto's pupils were marching against an order to teach them partly in Afrikaans; in 1991 African leaders named the day in memory of those who were killed.

A giant fish-shaped streamer made for Children's Day in Kazo, Saitama, in 1988 stretched roughly how far?

100 metres of streamer weighing 350 kg was the Kazo giant, dwarfing the household streamers flown above homes with children.

The Vatican's first World Children's Day, in May 2024, opened at which Rome venue before moving to St Peter's Square?

Stadio Olimpico, Rome's Olympic Stadium, hosted the festival's first day, and Pope Francis then announced that the next Vatican World Children's Day would not be held until 2026.

Japan's Children's Day grew from Tango no Sekku, a counterpart of which Chinese festival of the fifth lunar month?

The Dragon Boat Festival, or Duanwu, falls on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, a date once thought so unlucky that people hung herbs over their doors to ward off harm.

Until 2024 Bangladesh kept Children's Day on 17 March, the birthday of which founding leader known as Bangabandhu?

Sheikh Mujibur Rahman's birthday was a public holiday under Awami League governments, until the interim government struck it from the list of national days in 2024.

Shichi-Go-San gives Japanese children aged 3, 5 and 7 long chitose ame, a candy named for what?

A thousand years is what chitose means: the long red-and-white sticks stand for a long, healthy life, and the odd ages reflect an East Asian belief that odd numbers are lucky.

India's first Children's Day in 1954 drew more than 50,000 schoolchildren to the National Stadium in which city?

Delhi's National Stadium crowd gathered in the run-up to a 1957 edict that made the day official, when the Posts department issued commemorative stamps for 'Bal Din'.

V. M. Kulkarni's plan for a child-welfare 'Flag Day' on Nehru's birthday copied a British flag day on whose birthday?

Queen Elizabeth II's birthday flag day raised money for a children's fund, and Kulkarni, a UN social welfare fellow studying juvenile rehabilitation in the UK, realised India had no such system at all.

How did Jawaharlal Nehru first react when asked to let his birthday become a fundraising day for child welfare?

Embarrassed, then reluctant, Nehru conceded; he later said 'the children of today will make the India of tomorrow', and founded the Children's Film Society in 1955.

Which country's 5 May Children's Day grew from a 1920s movement, under Japanese rule, led by writer Bang Jeong-hwan?

South Korea honours Bang Jeong-hwan, who founded the children's magazine Eorini in 1923 and helped make stories and songs for children a genre of their own.

In Tango no Sekku, Japan's old Boys' Day, the 'go' is a form of the character for which zodiac animal?

Horse is the 'go', so tango first meant the first horse day of the fifth month; because go also sounds like 'five', the festival settled on the fifth day of the fifth month.

Why did samurai bring out armour and helmets each May, the origin of Japan's Children's Day kabuto displays?

To air before the rains: samurai took armour, kabuto and swords out of storage each May to care for them, and since this fell at Tango no Sekku they began displaying them to protect their children.

Japan's Children's Day on 5 May is the final holiday of which spring run of public holidays?

Golden Week runs from 29 April to 5 May, and when one of its holidays lands on a Sunday a substitute day off is added on 30 April or 6 May.

Hina dolls displayed for Japan's Girls' Day on 3 March portray which group in Heian-period dress?

The imperial court fills the tiers, with the emperor and empress on top; the display is said to date from 1629, when the young princess Meishō came to the throne.

Which country's Children's Day, 16 August, honours the boys who fought and died at the 1869 Battle of Acosta Ñu?

Paraguay calls it the Children's Battle: a force made up largely of boys, old men and the wounded faced a far larger army of Brazilian and Argentine veterans.

Which lantern-lit festival of the eighth lunar month is treated in Vietnam as a festival for children?

The Mid-Autumn Festival, Tết Trung Thu, has become Vietnam's children's festival: adults give toys and star-shaped lamps, and children parade with lanterns under the full moon.

International Children's Book Day falls on or around 2 April, the birthday of which fairy-tale author?

Hans Christian Andersen's birthday has anchored the day since 1967, when the International Board on Books for Young People began it to inspire a love of reading.

Which country joined South Sudan in ratifying the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 2015?

Somalia finished ratifying in 2015, the same year as South Sudan, which left just one UN member state outside the treaty.