100 free Eighth Grade trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
These 77 eighth grade trivia questions follow what most 8th graders in the United States actually study. The history half runs from Jamestown and the Mayflower Compact through the Revolution, the Constitution and Bill of Rights, the Louisiana Purchase, Lewis and Clark, the War of 1812, the Trail of Tears, the Civil War and Reconstruction. Science covers atoms and the periodic table, cells, photosynthesis, Newton's laws, density, pH, plate tectonics and the layers of the Earth. Math questions touch the Pythagorean theorem, slope, primes, order of operations, circles and scientific notation, and the reading list includes The Outsiders, The Giver, Anne Frank's diary, To Kill a Mockingbird and Romeo and Juliet. Every question is multiple choice and written so a 13- or 14-year-old who has been paying attention can get it, with a few harder ones to separate the honor roll from the rest. It works as a class warm-up, a review game before a test, a family quiz night with a middle schooler in the house, or a nostalgic check on how much you still remember from eighth grade. Answers were checked against encyclopaedia and primary sources, and each question shows its explanation and citation after you answer.
30 of 100 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In what city was the U.S. Constitution written and signed in 1787?
Philadelphia
The convention met at Independence Hall from May to September; Washington, D.C. did not exist yet.
Q 02How many articles does the original U.S. Constitution contain?
Seven
The first three set up the legislative, executive and judicial branches; the seventh explains how the document would be ratified.
Q 03How many times has the U.S. Constitution been amended?
27
The most recent, the 27th, deals with congressional pay and was ratified in 1992, more than 200 years after it was proposed.
Q 04What is the collective name for the first ten amendments to the Constitution?
The Bill of Rights
They were ratified on December 15, 1791, largely thanks to the efforts of James Madison in the House.
Q 05Which amendment protects freedom of speech, religion, the press, assembly and petition?
First
The Second covers the right to bear arms and the Fifth guards against self-incrimination.
Q 06The Fourth Amendment protects people against what?
Unreasonable searches and seizures
Police generally need a warrant based on probable cause, a rule that grew out of British searches of colonial homes.
Q 07The Declaration of Independence was adopted on July 4 of which year?
1776
The Second Continental Congress adopted it, and fifty-six delegates eventually signed.
Q 08Who was the principal author of the Declaration of Independence?
Thomas Jefferson
Jefferson wrote most of it between June 11 and 28; Franklin and Adams were on the drafting committee with him.
Q 09Per the Declaration of Independence, people have the rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of what?
Happiness
John Locke had written 'life, liberty and property'; Jefferson swapped the last word.
Q 10Which battles in April 1775 were the first of the American Revolutionary War?
Lexington and Concord
Paul Revere's ride the night before warned the countryside that British troops were marching from Boston.
Q 11Which 1781 siege was the decisive final victory of the Revolutionary War?
Yorktown
French ships blocked the British escape by sea, and King George III's government began negotiating peace.
Q 12Which country signed a Treaty of Alliance with the American revolutionaries in 1778?
France
The alliance came after the American victory at Saratoga convinced Europe the rebels could win.
Q 13Which 1783 peace agreement ended the Revolutionary War and recognised American independence?
Treaty of Paris
Confusingly, another Treaty of Paris in 1898 ended the Spanish-American War.
Q 21The Monroe Doctrine of 1823 warned which group of countries not to colonise the Americas?
European powers
It was written mostly by Secretary of State John Quincy Adams and largely ignored abroad at first.
Q 22Which president signed the Indian Removal Act of 1830 that led to the Trail of Tears?
Andrew Jackson
About 60,000 people from the Cherokee, Creek, Seminole, Chickasaw and Choctaw nations were forced west; thousands died on the way.
Q 23What was the first permanent English settlement in the Americas, founded in 1607?
Jamestown
Only 60 of 214 settlers survived the 'Starving Time' winter of 1609-10 before a cash crop turned things around.
Q 14What did the Sons of Liberty dump into the harbour during the Boston Tea Party in 1773?
Tea
Disguised as Native Americans, they boarded the Dartmouth and other ships in protest at the Tea Act; Britain answered with the Intolerable Acts.
Q 15From which country did the United States buy the Louisiana Territory in 1803?
France
Napoleon needed money for war in Europe, and the deal nearly doubled the size of the country.
Q 16Roughly how much did the United States pay for the Louisiana Purchase?
$15 million
That worked out to only a few cents an acre for about 828,000 square miles.
Q 17Which president sent Lewis and Clark to explore the West in 1804?
Thomas Jefferson
The Corps of Discovery left Camp Dubois in May 1804 and first sighted the ocean in November 1805.
Q 18Sacagawea, who helped the Lewis and Clark expedition as an interpreter, belonged to which nation?
Shoshone
She travelled with her husband Toussaint Charbonneau and her newborn son.
Q 19Which building did the British burn in August 1814 during the War of 1812?
The White House
The American win at New Orleans came in January 1815, after the peace treaty had already been signed in Ghent.
Q 20Francis Scott Key wrote 'The Star-Spangled Banner' after watching the bombardment of which fort in 1814?
McHenry
The poem was set to an English club tune and did not become the official national anthem until 1931.
Q 24Which crop, first harvested successfully by John Rolfe in 1614, made the Virginia colony profitable?
Tobacco
Rolfe also married Pocahontas, bringing a few years of peace between the settlers and the Powhatan.
Q 25The Mayflower Compact of 1620 was the first governing document of which colony?
Plymouth
Forty-one of the ship's 101 passengers signed it while anchored off Cape Cod.
Q 26Where did the American Civil War begin in April 1861?
Fort Sumter
Confederate guns opened fire on the Union-held fort in Charleston harbour; the war lasted until 1865.
Q 27Who was president of the Confederate States during the Civil War?
Jefferson Davis
Eleven states seceded to form the Confederacy, holding about a third of the U.S. population.
Q 28Where did Robert E. Lee surrender to Ulysses S. Grant in April 1865?
Appomattox Court House
Lincoln had issued the Emancipation Proclamation two years earlier, on January 1, 1863.
Q 29Which amendment, ratified in 1865, abolished slavery in the United States?
13th
It was the first of the three Reconstruction Amendments; the 15th (1870) barred denying the vote on account of race.
Q 30The Reconstruction era that followed the Civil War ended with a political compromise in which year?
1877
The Freedmen's Bureau had provided food and shelter to formerly enslaved people, but poll taxes and literacy tests soon followed.