Why do elephants have long trunks, and how big is the sun? Try our kids’ quiz

Illustration: Hennie Haworth/The Guardian

1. Morven, 4, asks: why do elephants have long trunks?

   1. To help them eat and drink as much as possible

   2. Way back in time, an elephant’s nose got stuck in a tree branch and it stretched and stretched

   3. So they can sneeze loudly and scare animals away

   4. So that they snore loudly at night and no predators come near them

2. Arran, 7, asks: how many animals are there on the planet?

   1. Over 10 trillion

   2. We have no idea how many

   3. Around a billion

   4. A hundred million

3. Flo, 7, asks: how big is the sun?

   1. The sun is so big, you could fit 1m Earths inside it

   2. The sun is the same size as the Earth

   3. The sun is smaller than the Earth

   4. The sun is seven times as big as the Earth

4. Frida, 7, asks: why do kings and queens sometimes wear crowns?

   1. They are very heavy, so it means kings and queens can’t run away easily

   2. To match their thrones

   3. Crowns have been worn as symbols of power since prehistoric times

   4. Wearing precious things on their heads keeps them safe

5. Stanley, 9, asks: why are we ticklish?

   1. So we laugh more, because laughing is good for us

   2. No scientist has tried to work it out, so we don’t know

   3. It’s a defence mechanism

   4. We evolved from monkeys and monkeys use tickling as a way to communicate

Solutions

1:A - An elephant’s legs are very long and its head is large and heavy, so bending down to eat and drink can be tiring. The long trunk helps it to get food without moving its head and to keep eating while grabbing more food!, 2:B - Counting the number of animals on Earth would be impossible: scientists think there may be 10bn bn ants and 18.6bn chickens, and those are just two of the millions of species we have., 3:A - The sun’s diameter (the distance from one side to the other, through the centre) is around 1.392m km. You could line up 109 Earths across its face, or fit 1m inside it., 4:C - Kings and queens have worn crowns since ancient times, ranging from wreaths made of leaves to jewels and gold to show wealth. The idea might come from antlers or the sun’s rays, which were both associated with power., 5:C - There are two different types of tickling. Knismesis is from a light touch and helps us to notice when something unexpected touches our skin, like a mosquito. Gargalesis makes us laugh and could be an automatic defence mechanism that helps us protect sensitive parts of our bodies, like our stomachs.

Scores

1. 5 and above.

2. 4 and above.

3. 3 and above.

4. 2 and above.

5. 0 and above.

6. 1 and above.

Molly Oldfield hosts Everything Under the Sun, a weekly podcast answering children’s questions, out now as a book.

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