There’s a specific kind of humility that comes with looking at an elementary school worksheet as an adult. Perhaps you’re attempting to help your own kid with their homework and realized you’ve completely forgotten how long division works. Or maybe you’re hosting a grown-up game night and want a set of so-called kiddie questions to humble your smartest friends. You might even just want to test your cognitive retention against the facts you supposedly mastered decades ago, seeing if those mental cogs are still turning or a little rusty.

Whatever the reason you found yourself here, buckle up—or in this case, sharpen your pencils. Some of these questions are schoolyard basics, but a choice few are bound to leave you bamboozled.

Here are 100 of the best “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?” trivia questions to test your elementary knowledge, organized by school subject and ranked from easiest to hardest.

Geography

From memorizing every state capital to identifying the oceans and rivers that carve up our maps, these foundational geography questions will test how well you remember the world outside your own front door.

1. How many U.S. states are there?

Answer: 50

2. How many continents are there?

Answer: Seven

3. What is the largest ocean on Earth?

Answer: Pacific Ocean

4. What is the capital of France?

Answer: Paris

5. What is the capital of Japan?

Answer: Tokyo

6. What is the tallest mountain in the world?

Answer: Mount Everest

7. What is the longest river in the world?

Answer: The Nile River

8. In which country are the Pyramids of Giza located?

Answer: Egypt

9. What is the largest country?

Answer: Russia

10. What is the capital of Canada?

Answer: Ottawa

11. What is the world’s largest desert?

Answer: The Sahara Desert

12. What is the world’s largest tropical rainforest?

Answer: The Amazon

13. Which continent is the driest?

Answer: Antarctica

14. In which hemisphere is the Tropic of Capricorn located?

Answer: Southern Hemisphere

Science

Whether it’s basic human anatomy, the chemical compounds of everyday water, or the fundamental physical forces that keep our feet on the floor, early science classes taught us exactly how our physical world ticks.

15. What gas do humans need to breathe?

Answer: Oxygen

16. What force keeps us on the ground?

Answer: Gravity

17. How many bones are in the human body?

Answer: 206

18. What is the largest human organ?

Answer: Skin

19. What is the hardest natural substance on Earth?

Answer: Diamond

20. What is the chemical formula for water?

Answer: H₂O

21. What gas do plants absorb from the atmosphere?

Answer: Carbon dioxide

22. What is the process called in which water turns into vapor?

Answer: Evaporation

23. What is the process by which plants make their food called?

Answer: Photosynthesis

24. What is the center of an atom called?

Answer: Nucleus

25. What is the powerhouse of the cell?

Answer: Mitochondria

26. What is the freezing point of water in degrees Fahrenheit?

Answer: 32 degrees Fahrenheit

27. What is the most common gas in Earth’s atmosphere?

Answer: Nitrogen

28. What is the longest bone in the human body?

Answer: Femur

29. What is the most abundant element in the universe?

Answer: Hydrogen

History

Take a walk back through time to test your retention of historical turning points, constitutional rights, and the pioneering figures who changed the course of human civilization forever.

30. Who was the first president of the United States?

Answer: George Washington

31. Who was the 16th president of the U.S.?

Answer: Abraham Lincoln

32. The Statue of Liberty was a gift to the U.S. from which country?

Answer: France

33. Which famous ship sank on its first voyage in 1912?

Answer: The Titanic

34. In which country did the first Olympic Games take place?

Answer: Greece

35. Who painted the Mona Lisa?

Answer: Leonardo da Vinci

36. Who invented the lightbulb?

Answer: Thomas Edison

37. Who were the first people in America?

Answer: Native Americans

38. Who famously refused to give up her bus seat in Montgomery, Alabama?

Answer: Rosa Parks

39. What are the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution known as?

Answer: The Bill of Rights

40. Which Norse seafarers explored Europe?

Answer: The Vikings

41. Who founded the Red Cross?

Answer: Clara Barton

42. Who discovered electricity?

Answer: Benjamin Franklin

43. What was the name of the last Queen of France?

Answer: Marie Antoinette

44. Who developed the theory of relativity?

Answer: Albert Einstein

Space

Look up toward the night sky to revisit the basics of astronomy, our immediate solar neighborhood, cosmic bodies, and the iconic historical missions that finally sent humans beyond Earth’s atmosphere.

45. What is Earth’s only natural satellite?

Answer: The Moon

46. What is the main source of energy for the Earth?

Answer: The Sun

47. How many planets are in the solar system?

Answer: Eight

48. What is the Red Planet?

Answer: Mars

49. Which planet has rings?

Answer: Saturn

50. What was once known as the ninth planet in our solar system?

Answer: Pluto

51. Which planet is closest to the Sun?

Answer: Mercury

52. What is the largest planet?

Answer: Jupiter

53. Who was the first person to walk on the moon?

Answer: Neil Armstrong

54. If the Sun is rising behind you, which direction are you facing?

Answer: West

55. Which planet is the coldest?

Answer: Neptune

56. What are the rocky objects that orbit the Sun between Mars and Jupiter called?

Answer: Asteroids

57. Pisces is a constellation that looks like what?

Answer: Fish

58. What was the name of the first satellite pulled into orbit by the US?

Answer: Explorer

Animals & Nature

From the color of leaves to the diverse species roaming the land, seas, and skies, this section covers the ABCs of animals and the natural world.

59. What is a baby cat called?

Answer: Kitten

60. How many legs does a spider have?

Answer: Eight

61. Which animal is known as the “King of the Jungle”?

Answer: Lion

62. What type of animal is a frog?

Answer: Amphibian

63. What is the tallest animal in the world?

Answer: Giraffe

64. What is the largest mammal in the world?

Answer: Blue whale

65. What is the largest land animal?

Answer: Elephant

66. What tree do acorns come from?

Answer: Oak tree

67. What do bees collect from flowers?

Answer: Nectar

68. Animals who eat only plants are called what?

Answer: Herbivores

69. What animal has a female called a ewe?

Answer: Sheep

70. How many colors are in a rainbow?

Answer: Seven

71. What color is chlorophyll?

Answer: Green

72. What do you call the process of a caterpillar becoming a butterfly?

Answer: Metamorphosis

Math

Put your smartphone calculator to the side and turn to mental math to handle the basic multiplication, quick percentages, geometric structures, and word problems that may or may not have been the bane of your existence during school.

73. How many inches are in a foot?

Answer: 12

74. What is 10 ÷ 2?

Answer: 5

75. What is 25% of 100?

Answer: 25

76. A hexagon has how many sides?

Answer: Six

77. What is 7 × 8?

Answer: 56

78. What is the square root of 81?

Answer: 9

79. What is the sum of the angles in a triangle?

Answer: 180 degrees

80. What is pi (to two decimal places)?

Answer: 3.14

81. How many times can 6 be subtracted from 48?

Answer: 8

82. How many teaspoons are in 5 tablespoons?

Answer: 15

83. How many feet is 3.5 yards?

Answer: 10.5 feet

84. What whole number is closest to the square root of 65?

Answer: 8

85. What is the area of a right triangle with a height of 6 and a base of 8?

Answer: 24

86. If a car is traveling at 60 mph, how long will it take to go 390 miles?

Answer: 6 hours, 30 minutes

Language Arts

It takes more than simple spelling skills to conquer fifth-grade language arts. Brush up on your literary devices, narrative elements, parts of speech, and classic required reading.

87. What kinds of words are always capitalized?

Answer: Proper nouns

88. What is the plural form of the word “moose”?

Answer: Moose

89. Who wrote Romeo and Juliet?

Answer: William Shakespeare

90. Who wrote the famous adventure novels starring Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn?

Answer: Mark Twain

91. What is the main character in a story called?

Answer: Protagonist

92. The main series of events in a story is called a what?

Answer: Plot

93. What is the term for a word that is similar in meaning to another word?

Answer: Synonym

94. What do you call a word or phrase that reads the same forward and backward?

Answer: Palindrome

95. A story conveying a moral lesson is called what?

Answer: Fable

96. What is a hyperbole?

Answer: An exaggeration used for emphasis

97. “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers” is an example of what?

Answer: Alliteration

98. The figurative language in this sentence is called what? “The classroom was a zoo.”

Answer: Metaphor

99. How many syllables are in each line of a haiku?

Answer: 5-7-5

100. What does IQ stand for?

Answer: Intelligence Quotient

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