Facts for Ages 11–13
130 facts perfect for this age group
Point Nemo in the Pacific Ocean is the farthest place from any land — the closest humans are astronauts on the International Space Station.
'Red sky at night, sailor's delight' is based on real science — a red sunset means dry weather is likely coming.
The Sun is incredibly loud, but we can't hear it because sound can't travel through the vacuum of space.
French was the official language of England for over 300 years after the Norman Conquest in 1066.
The idea for Post-it Notes clicked when a 3M scientist needed a bookmark that wouldn't fall out of his hymn book at church.
Your body has roughly as many bacterial cells as human cells — about 38 trillion of each.
For a snowstorm to officially be called a blizzard, it must have winds of at least 35 mph and low visibility for three hours.
Venus is the hottest planet in our solar system at around 900°F, even though Mercury is closer to the Sun.
The ancient Silk Road was a network of trade routes stretching over 4,000 miles connecting China to the Mediterranean.
Ancient Egyptians did multiplication by doubling and adding — a clever system that's similar to how computers calculate today.
The Eiffel Tower leans away from the Sun because heat makes the metal on the sunny side expand.
The Chinese invented paper money during the Tang Dynasty around the 7th century — over 1,000 years before Europe.
X-rays were discovered by accident in 1895 when Wilhelm Roentgen noticed a strange glow coming from his equipment.
A language dies roughly every two weeks — about 40% of all languages are now endangered.
The Pirahã people of Brazil speak a language that has no words for specific numbers — they only have words meaning "few" and "many."
Dolphins can stay awake for 15 days straight by resting one half of their brain at a time.
The Earth is not a perfect sphere — it's slightly squished at the poles and bulges at the equator.
The Rosetta Stone, discovered in 1799, was the key that helped scholars finally read ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics.
Plesiosaurs, the long-necked sea creatures, lived at the same time as dinosaurs but were technically not dinosaurs.
Acid rain is real — it's caused by pollution mixing with water in the atmosphere, and it can damage buildings and forests.