Why do sloths hang upside down and what is time? The kids’ quiz

1. Evie, 6, asks: why do sloths hang upside down?

   1. Sloths love to see things from a fresh perspective

   2. To get blood to their brains

   3. To save energy and to reach the tastiest leaves

   4. They want to copy bats

2. Vincent, 5, asks: what is time?

   1. Right now, it’s 11.44am

   2. Time is a way we measure out days and weeks and years, past, present, future

   3. It’s a herb used in cooking

   4. Time is a green fruit

3. Bailey, 4, asks: what is the largest number you can count to?

   1. 1,000 – most people get bored and stop by then!

   2. It’s too tricky to count above 200,000

   3. 9,999,999 – the end of all the numbers

   4. There is no limit, but there is a current world record of 1,070,000

4. Tabitha, 10, asks: why do we have seasons?

   1. Because the Earth rotates on a tilt

   2. The sun likes to take a rest sometimes

   3. In the winter, clouds get thicker and stop the sun’s warmth

   4. Jupiter creates the seasons on Earth

5. Benjamin, 12, asks: what are gamma rays and where do they come from?

   1. They’re a type of heat that comes from mould

   2. They’re soap droplets that come from flowers

   3. Gamma rays are green and come from algae

   4. They are powerful waves of energy from the centres of radioactive atoms

Solutions

1:C - Sloths hang upside down mainly to conserve energy, and to help them reach the leaves that are easy to digest. Unlike humans, their bodies are adapted to work well upside down for 90% of the day., 2:B - Well, it was 11.44 when I was writing this answer, in France! A lot of time has passed since then. There are complex answers from physicists and philosophers but, put simply, time is a way for us to measure how long things take, using clocks and calendars., 3:D - Numbers go on infinitely, but in 2025 Favour Ogechi Ani from Nigeria broke a world record by counting aloud to 1,070,000 over 70 consecutive days., 4:A - The Earth orbits the sun and rotates, but it’s on a tilt of about 23.5 degrees. When the northern hemisphere, including the UK, is angled towards the sun, it’s our summer. When it’s tilted away from the sun, temperatures are colder., 5:D - A gamma ray is the highest-energy type of electromagnetic radiation. It is produced through the decay of an atomic nucleus (centre of an atom), or during solar flares in space.

Scores

1. 5 and above.

2. 4 and above.

3. 3 and above.

4. 2 and above.

5. 0 and above.

Molly Oldfield hosts Everything Under the Sun, a podcast answering children’s questions. Do check out her books, Everything Under the Sun and Everything Under the Sun: Quiz Book, as well as her new title, Everything Under the Sun: All Around the World.