Facts for Ages 11–13
1607 facts perfect for this age group
The influenza pandemic of 1918-1919, often called the Spanish Flu, infected an estimated 500 million people — one third of the world's population — and killed between 50 and 100 million people. This was more than all the deaths of World War One. The virus was unusually deadly to young, healthy adults in their 20s and 30s.
Your stomach acid is so strong (with a pH as low as 1.0) that it could dissolve a metal razor blade. The stomach lining replaces itself every three to four days to survive.
The mantis shrimp can punch with the speed and force of a small-calibre bullet, shattering crab shells and even cracking aquarium glass.
Veins look bluish through skin not because the blood inside is blue — it is always red — but because blue light penetrates skin differently to red light.
Tornadoes are rated on the Enhanced Fujita Scale from EF0 to EF5. An EF5 tornado can have winds exceeding 320 kilometres per hour and can level well-built houses.
Cape Horn at the southern tip of South America is one of the most treacherous stretches of ocean in the world, known for fierce storms and huge waves.
Goosebumps are a leftover reflex from when our ancestors had much more body hair. The raised hairs would have trapped warm air or made them look bigger to predators.
The coelacanth was thought to have been extinct for 66 million years until a living specimen was caught off South Africa in 1938. It is considered a living fossil and gives scientists clues about how fish first moved onto land.
France is the largest country in the European Union by land area, and it also has the largest exclusive economic zone in the world due to its many overseas territories.
Your entire skeleton is completely replaced with new bone roughly every 10 years. Old bone is constantly being broken down and rebuilt by specialised cells.
Some baby sauropods hatched from eggs the size of a football but grew to weigh over 30 tonnes in just 15–20 years — one of the fastest growth rates of any animal ever.
The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a floating mass of plastic debris roughly twice the size of Texas, circulating in the North Pacific Ocean.
More than half of all stars in the Milky Way exist as binary systems — two stars orbiting each other. Our Sun is unusual in being a solitary star.
Golf courses have 18 holes because of a historic decision at the St Andrews golf course in Scotland. In 1858, members voted to combine its original 22 holes into 18 by merging some shorter holes, and the format became the global standard.
About 6,000 years ago, the Sahara was a lush, green landscape with lakes, rivers, and abundant wildlife. Climate shifts gradually turned it into the desert we see today.
Yoghurt is believed to have been discovered by accident around 5,000–10,000 BCE when nomads in Central Asia stored fresh milk in pouches made from animal stomachs, which naturally fermented the milk.
The Olympic decathlon tests athletes across ten different track and field events over two days, including sprinting, jumping, and throwing. The winner is often called the 'world's greatest athlete'.
Trees communicate with each other through an underground network of fungi, sometimes called the "wood wide web."
Researchers found that plants can detect the vibrations of caterpillars chewing their leaves and respond by producing defensive chemicals to make themselves taste worse.
The Arabian Peninsula is the world's largest peninsula, covering about 3.2 million square kilometres and home to countries including Saudi Arabia, Yemen, and Oman.