Facts about Japan

Official Name: Japan
Form of Government: Constitutional monarchy with parliamentary government
Capital: Tokyo
Population: 126, 048, 450
Official Language: Japanese
Money: Japanese yen
Area: 377,835 square kilometres
Major Mountain Ranges: Japanese Alps
Major Rivers: Biwa, Inawashiro, Kasumigaura

Japanese flag

Map of Japan

Japan: geography and landscape

Japan is an archipelago, or string of islands, on the eastern edge of Asia. There are four main islands - Hokkaido, Honshu, Shikoku and Kyushu. There are also nearly 4,000 smaller islands, too! Japan's nearest mainland neighbors are the Siberian region of Russia in the north, and Koreaand China farther south.

Almost four-fifths of Japan is covered with mountains. The Japanese Alps run down the centre of the largest island, Honshu. The highest peak and Japan’s most famous mountain is Mount Fuji, a cone-shaped volcano considered sacred by many Japanese.

Japan can be a dangerous place. Three of the tectonic plates that form the Earth's crust meet nearby and often move against each other, causing earthquakes. More than a thousand earthquakes hit Japan every year. Japan also has about 200 volcanoes, 60 of which are still active.

Japan's wildlife and nature

The Japanese people have a deep affection for the beauty of the landscape. The ancient Shintoreligion says natural features like mountains, waterfalls and forests have their own spirit or soul.

Japan is home to some wonderful wildlife! Some of the country’s most incredible creatures include the sika deer, red-crowned crane, stellar’s sea eagle and one of the coolest critters on the planet...the Japanese macaque monkey!

Most of Japan is covered by countryside - but with more than 100 million people living in such a small place, sadly, wildlife has suffered. Although pollution is now tightly controlled, over the years, road building and other human activities have harmed natural habitats. Today, about 136 species in Japan are listed as endangered.

Off the coast of this incredible country, the warm Tsushima Current flows from the south into the Sea of Japan, where it meets a colder current from the north. As a result of the mixing of different waters, the seas around Japan are very rich in fish and other sea life. Cool!

Would you ever want to visit Japan? Why or why not?

Ten Facts about Ancient Egypt!

Facts about Egypt

1. Most Ancient Egyptian pyramids were built as tombs for pharaohs (rulers of Ancient Egypt) and their families. To date, over 130 pyramids have been discovered in Egypt. 

2. The afterlife was incredibly important to the Egyptians. They believed that by preserving a dead person's body - which they did through the process of mummification - their soul would live on in the after-life forever.

3. The Pyramid of Khufu at Giza is the largest Egyptian pyramid. This incredible structure weighs as much as 16 Empire State buildings!

4. Both Egyptian men and women wore makeup. The eye-paint was usually green (made from copper) or black (made from lead). As well as offering protection from the sun, the Egyptians believed makeup had magical healing powers, too!

5. Unwrapped, the bandages of an Ancient Egyptian mummy could stretch for 1.6km. Yikes!

6. The Egyptian alphabet contained more than 700 hieroglyphs! Uncover the meaning behind these ancient symbols HERE.7. Ancient Egyptians believed in more than 2,000 deities! They had gods for everything from, dangers to chores! Each had different responsibilities and needed to be worshipped so that life could be kept in balance. 

8. Cats were considered to be a sacred animal by the Ancient Egyptians. It's thought that most families kept a cat as a pet, which they believed would bring the household good luck!  9. Love playing boardgames with your pals? Well, gang - so did the Ancient Egyptians! One popular game was 'Senet', which was played for over 2000 years! The game involved throwing sticks (in the same way we throw dice) to see how many squares to move your piece forward on the board.10. The Ancient Egyptians invented lots of things we still use today, such as paper, pens, locks and keys and - believe it or not - toothpaste! 

What are 3 facts you learned about Egypt?

Structure of the Earth!

Get ready to dig deep, gang, and join us on a fascinating journey to the centre of the Earth!...

The secrets buried inside our planet are revealed by recording and studying things called seismic waves. Caused by things like earthquakes, explosions and the movement of our oceans, there are two types of seismic wave – a shear wave, which won't travel through liquid; and a pressure wave, which moves through both liquid and solids. These waves show that the Earth is made from five layers: the inner and outer core, the lower and upper mantle, and the crust. 

Inner Core

Temperature: 5,000°C - 6,000°CState: SolidComposition: iron and nickel
The Earth’s inner core is a huge metal ball, 2,500km wide. Made mainly of iron, the temperature of the ball is 5,000°C to 6,000°C – that’s up to 6,000 times hotter than our atmosphere and scorching enough to make metal melt! The metal at the inner core stays solid because of the incredible pressure surrounding it.

Outer Core

Temperature: 4,000°C – 6,000°C

State: Liquid

Composition: iron, nickel, sulphur and oxygen

This liquid layer of iron and nickel is 5,150km deep. The outer core flows around the centre of the Earth, and the movement of the metals creates our planet’s magnetic field.

Lower Mantle

Temperature: 3,000°CState: solid
Composition: iron, oxygen, silicon, magnesium and aluminium

The lower mantle is found between 670km and 2,890km below the surface, and is made from  solid rock. The rock is hot enough to melt, but is solid because of the pressure pushing down on it.

Upper Mantle

Temperature: 1,400°C – 3,000°C

State: liquid / solid

Composition: iron, oxygen, silicon, magnesium and aluminium

This layer is up to 670km below the Earth’s surface. The lower part of the upper mantle is made from both solid and melted rock (liquid), while the rock in the upper region is stiffer, because it’s cooler.

Crust

Temperature: Around 22°C

State: Solid 

Composition: Oceanic crust made up of iron, oxygen, silicon, magnesium and aluminium.

                        Continental crust made up of granite, sedimentary rocks and metamorphic rocks.

The Earth's surface is covered by its thinnest layer, the crust. Land is made of continental crust, which is 8km to 70km thick and made mostly from a rock called granite. The layer beneath the ocean bed is made of oceanic crust, which is about 8km thick and made mainly from a rock called basalt.

By studying rocks and meteorites (rocks from space), scientists believe the Earth is about 4.5 billion years old!

What part of the Earth do we live on? How do you know?

Ten Facts about Space!

We’re off on an adventure out of this world to discover ten stellar facts about space!

1) One million Earths could fit inside the sun - and the sun is considered an average-size star. 

2) For years it was believed that Earth was the only planet in our solar system with liquid water. More recently, NASA revealed its strongest evidence yet that there is intermittent running water on Mars, too! 

3) Comets are leftovers from the creation of our solar system about 4.5 billion years ago - they consist of sand, ice and carbon dioxide.

4) You wouldn't be able to walk on Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus or Neptune because they have no solid surface!

5) If you could fly a plane to Pluto, the trip would take more than 800 years!
6) Space junk is any human-made object orbiting Earth that no longer serves a useful purpose. Scientists estimate there are about 500,000 pieces of space junk today, including fragments from rockets and satellites, and everyday items like spanners dropped during construction of the International Space Station!   

7) An asteroid about the size of a car enters Earth’s atmosphere roughly once a year - but it burns up before it reaches us. Phew!

8) The highest mountain known to man is on an asteroid called Vesta. Measuring a whopping 22km in height, it is three times as tall as Mount Everest! 

9) There are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all the beaches on Earth. That's at least a billion trillion!

10) The sunset on Mars appears blue.

And now, get ready for the lowdown on the planets of our solar system to one seriously sick beat! Just a word of warning - you might end up singing the song in your head all day!

Click the link below to watch the video

Space Facts Video

Do you think that there could be life on any other planet?

Ten Facts about Hurricanes!

Hold on tight, gang - and we mean super tight! - because we're about to check out ten facts on one of nature's most powerful forces - hurricanes!

1) Hurricanes are giant tropical storms that produce heavy rainfall and super-strong winds.

2) Hurricanes form over warm ocean waters near the equator. The warm, moist air above the ocean surface rises, causing air from surrounding areas to be 'sucked' in. This 'new' air then becomes warm and moist, and rises, too, beginning a continuous cycle that forms clouds. The clouds then rotate with the spin of the Earth. If there is enough warm water to feed the storm, a hurricane forms!

3) Hurricanes rotate around a circular centre called the 'eye', where it is generally calm with no clouds. Surrounding the eye is the eye wall - the most dangerous part of the hurricane with the strongest winds, thickest clouds and heaviest rain!

4) Most hurricanes occur harmlessly out at sea. However, when they move towards land they can be incredibly dangerous and cause serious damage.

5) The strong spiraling winds of a hurricane can reach speeds of up to 320kmph - strong enough to rip up entire trees and destroy buildings!

6) In the southern hemisphere, hurricanes rotate in a clockwise direction, and in the northern hemisphere they rotate in an anti-clockwise direction. This is due to what's called the Coriolis Force, produced by the Earth's rotation. 

7) When a hurricane reaches land it often produces a 'storm surge'. This is when the high winds drive the sea toward the shore, causing water levels to rise and creating large crashing waves. Storm surges can reach 6m high and extend to over 150km!

8) Hurricanes are also called cyclones and typhoons, depending on where they occur. In the Atlantic Ocean and Northwest Pacific they are hurricanes, in the Northwest Pacific they are typhoons and in the South Pacific and Indian Ocean they are cyclones.

9) The largest hurricane on record is Typhoon Tip, which occurred in 1979 in the northwest Pacific. With a diameter of around 2,220km, it was nearly half the size of the United States!

10) Hurricanes are given names by the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) so that they can be distinguished. Each year, tropical storms are named in alphabetical order according to a list produced by the WMO. That name stays with the storm if it develops into a hurricane. The names can only be repeated after six years.

How do you think is the best way to prepare for a hurricane?

Your Amazing Brain!

Inside your body's control centre...

There's a mass of wrinkly material in your head, weighing around 1.3kg, which controls every single thing you will ever do. It enables you to think, learn, create and feel emotions, as well as controlling every blink, breath and heartbeat. This fantastic organ is your brain! It’s so amazing that famous scientist James D. Watson once called the brain "the most complex thing we have yet discovered in our universe." Here's why!

Your brain is faster and more powerful than a supercomputer!

Your kitten is in the kitchen. She's about to step on the hot cooker. You have only seconds to act. Accessing the signals coming from your eyes, your brain quickly calculates when, where, and at what speed you will need to leap to stop her. Then it orders your muscles to spring into action. Your timing is perfect, and she’s safe! No computer can come close to your brain's amazing ability to download, process, and react to the flood of information coming from your eyes, ears and other sensory organs. Cool!

Your brain generates enough electricty to power a lightbulb

Your brain contains about 100 billion microscopic cells called neurons. There are so many, it would take you over 3,000 years to count them all! Whenever you dream, laugh, think, see or move, it’s because minute chemical and electrical signals are racing between these neurons along billions of tiny neuron pathways. Incredibly, the activity in your brain never stops. Countless messages zip around inside it every second – just like a supercharged pinball machine. Your neurons create and send more messages than all the phones in the entire world. And while a single neuron generates only a very small amount of electricity, all your neurons together can produce enough energy to power a low-wattage light bulb. Imagine that!

Neurons send information to your brain at more than 240kmph!

A bee lands on your bare foot. Eek! Sensory neurons in your skin relay this information to your spinal cord and brain at a speed of more than 240kmph. Your brain then uses motor neurons to transmit the message back through your spinal cord to your foot – to shake the bee off quickly! Motor neurons can relay this message at more than 320kmph. Wow!

When you learn, you change the stucture of your brain

Riding a bike seems impossible at first, but soon you master it. How? As you practise, your brain sends ‘bike riding’ messages along pathways of neurons again and again, forming new connections. In fact, the structure of your brain changes every time you learn, as well as whenever you have a new thought or memory. Now that’s clever!

Exercise helps make you smarter

It’s well known that any exercise that makes your heart beat faster – like running or playing a sport – is great for your body and can even help improve your mood. But scientists have recently learned that for a period of time after you’ve exercised, your body produces a chemical that makes your brain more willing to learn. So, if you’re stuck on some tricky homework, go out and run around for a while, then tackle the problem again. You might discover that you’re much more able to solve it!

What are 3 things you have learned about your brain?

The Water Cycle!

Pour yourself a glass of water and take a sip. Did you know that the water you've just swallowed is the same water that wooly mammoths, King Tutankhamun and the first humans drank? That's because Earth has been recycling water for over 4 billion years!

The world's water moves between lakes, rivers, oceans, the atmosphere and the land in an ongoing cycle called - you guessed it! - the water cycle. As it goes through this continuous system, it can be a liquid (water), a gas (vapour) or a solid (ice).

So, are all you budding young geographers ready to learn some splashing new facts? Then join NG KiDS as we take a look at the different stages of the wonderful water cycle...

Evaporation

Energy from the sun heats up the surface of the Earth, causing the temperature of the water in our rivers, lakes and oceans to rise. When this happens, some of the water 'evaporates' into the air, turning into a gas called 'vapour'. Plants and trees also lose water to the atmosphere through their leaves. This process is known as 'transpiration'.

Condensation

As water vapour rises up high into the sky, it cools and turns back into a liquid, forming clouds. This process is called 'condensation'. Currents high up in the air move these clouds around the globe.

The water cycle is also known as the 'hydrologic cycle'.

Precipitation

When too much water has condensed, the water droplets in the clouds become too big and heavy for the air to hold them. And so they fall back down to Earth as rain, snow, hail or sleet, a process known as 'precipitation'. 

Collection

The fallen precipitation is then 'collected' in bodies of water - such as rivers, lakes and oceans - from where it will eventually evaporate back into the air, beginning the cycle all over again. How it is collected, depends on where it lands...

- Some will fall directly into lakes, rivers or the sea, from where it will evaporate and begin the cycle all over again.

- If the water falls on vegetation, it may evaporate from leaves back into the air, or trickle down to the ground. Some of this water may then be taken up by the plant roots in the earth. 

- In cold climates, the precipitation may build up on land as snow, ice or glaciers. If temperatures rise, the ice will melt to liquid water and then soak into the ground, or flow into rivers or the ocean.

- Water that reaches land directly may flow across the ground and collect in the oceans, rivers or lakes. This water is called 'surface run-off'. Some of the precipitation will instead soak (or 'infiltrate') into the soil, from where it will slowly move through the ground until eventually reaching a river or the ocean. 

And there you have it, gang - the ongoing water cycle!

Water can change from a solid to a gas, without becoming a liquid first. Through this process of 'sublimation' our planet's ice can evaporate directly into the air without melting!

How does the water cycle affect you every day?

 

 

10 totally awesome facts about turtles!

Here at NG Kids we’re turtally mad about turtles, that’s why we’ve put together these ten terrific turtle facts!

These magnificent creatures come in all shapes and sizes and live in a number of different environments. They all belong to a group of reptiles called Testudines, which includes turtles, tortoises, and terrapins.

From giant, slow-moving land-dwelling tortoises and snappy terrapins basking in their fresh-water lagoons, to the graceful strokes of a sea turtle gliding through our oceans - check out our ten totally awesome turtle facts, below!

Turtle facts

1. Turtles belong to one of the oldest reptile groups in the world - beating snakes, crocodiles and alligators!

  

2. These creatures date back to the time of the dinosaurs, over 200 million years ago - woah!

3. Turtles are easily recognised by their bony, cartilaginous shell. This super-tough casing acts like a shield to protect them from predators - some turtles can even tuck their head up inside their shell for extra protection!

4. Just like your bones, a turtle’s shell is actually part of its skeleton. It’s made up of over 50 boneswhich include the turtle’s rib cage and spine.

5. Contrary to popular belief, a turtle cannot come out of its shell. The turtle’s shell grows with them, so it’s impossible for them to grow too big for it!

6. What a turtle eats depends on the environment it lives in. Land-dwelling turtles will munch on beetles, fruit and grass, whereas sea dwellers will gobble everything from algae to squid and jellyfish.

7. Some turtles are carnivores (meat eaters), others are herbivores (plant eaters) and some are omnivores (a mixture of the two!). Many baby turtles start life as carnivores but grow to eat more plants as they mature.

8. Turtles are ‘amniotes’ - they breathe air and lay their eggs on land, although many species live in or around water.

9. These cold-blooded creatures have an incredibly long life span. The oldest ever recorded, named Tu'i Malila, of Tonga Island, passed away at the grand old age of 188!

10. Sadly, many species of turtle are endangered! 129 of approximately 300 species of turtle and tortoise on Earth today are either vulnerable, endangered, or critically endangered, according to the IUCN. Threats include loss of habitat, poaching and the illegal pet trade.

Do you think our classroom turtle is a sea turtle? Why or why not.