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About This Quiz
Ninth grade is a big deal for most Americans. It's the first year of high school and a lot of changes are being made. The first things you need to learn are that recess is gone, and no matter how many seniors tell you there's a pool on the roof, there isn't. The entire school may call you out during the pep rallies, and you probably won't be old enough to drive or be cool or do anything else except adapt to your new surroundings. Once you get your head around all that, you can focus on learning some cool ninth-grade curriculum.
The books get upgraded from "Tuck Everlasting" and "The Bridge to Terabithia" to "1984" and "Oedipus Rex." General science turns into biology. Social studies turns into American history. And general arithmetic turns into algebra and geometry. As long as you paid a bit of attention in middle school, you'll be in the perfect position to continue your higher learning. It's impossible to forget everything over summer break, but some brushing up is probably required. So let's see what you've got.
What do you know about the U.S. presidents? What do you know about the most popular books in the country? Is your vocabulary up to par and do you know the sixth planet from the sun? Put your skills to the test and see if you can pass this ninth-grade learning test.
Form hypothesis
Conduct research
Identify problem
The scientific method is more of a general set of guidelines than a strict set of steps, but the first step is always to identify a problem. This step may also be listed as "ask a question" or "make an observation," but they mean the same thing.
Draw conclusions
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Dilema
Dilemma
The producers of Woodstock in 1969 were faced with a dilemma come showtime. They could either build a stage so performers could perform or build a fence so they could charge admission, but they couldn't do both. They ended up putting on a historic free show.
Dillemma
Dillema
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"Animal Farm"
"Fahrenheit 451"
"1984"
"Lord of the Flies"
"Lord of the Flies" was written in 1954 and follows a group of boys who get trapped on a deserted island. Two movie adaptations have been made and a third is on the way. The book is commonly read in ninth-grade classrooms across the country.
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Elicit
Illicit
Elicit is a verb meaning to evoke, and illicit is an adjective meaning illegal. They are pronounced the same way but have completely different meanings. The word "illicit" stems from 16th century French and "elicit" stems from 17th century Latin.
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1633
1492
1215
The Magna Carta was published in 1215 under King John of England. The charter of rights was one of the first of its kind and laid the groundwork for other charters that followed, including the Bill of Rights and U.S. Constitution.
525 BC
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Iran Contra Affair
Teapot Dome Scandal
Petticoat Affair
Watergate Scandal
Richard Nixon is the only president to resign from office but he was never impeached. He was going to get impeached and likely be removed from office, so he resigned before all that happened. No president has ever been impeached and removed from office.
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Stratosphere
Core
Crust
Mantle
The top layer of Earth (crust) is about 18 miles thick, but is only a few miles thick under the ocean floor. More than 80% of the Earth is the mantle, which is the second layer and is close to 2,000 miles thick.
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Delayed nuclear assistance
Double-new acid
Double nucleus acids
Deoxyribonucleic acid
DNA stands for deoxyribonucleic acid and is the building block of life. It encodes genetic directions into all living things and is so complex that it's still not fully understood. The DNA molecule consists of two strands that coil to form a double helix.
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Devestated
Devastated
The English language is full of tricky words, and this is one of them. The first "a" is commonly mistaken for an "e," but this word has two a's and two e's. Devastate is a verb that means to destroy or cause overwhelming stress.
Devestaded
Devastaded
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"The Iliad"
"Treasure Island"
"Of Mice and Men"
This novel is one of John Steinbeck's most popular and follows a couple of ranch hands as they try to survive the Great Depression. He wrote "The Grapes of Wrath" about two years later, and it, too, is set during the Great Depression.
"Animal Farm"
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Guerila
Guerilla
Guerrila
Guerrilla
Guerrilla is another tricky word to spell, but just remember all consonants are doubled except for the "g." The word doesn't stem from the animal, but instead stems from the Spanish word "guerra," which means war.
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Washington, D.C.
Philadelphia
Before Washington, D.C. became the permanent capital of the country, both NYC and Philly served as capital for some time. Philly's Independence Hall was the site where the First and Second Continental Congresses held debate and discussion.
New York City
Boston
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Appoint federal judges
Public school funding
Negotiate foreign treaties
Create laws
The legislative branch of the government creates legislation. The executive branch executes the legislation. And the judicial branch judges the legislation. Each branch has other powers that serve as checks and balances on each branch.
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Equator
Prime meridian
The prime meridian is the imaginary line that splits the globe in half latitudinally. The equator splits the globe in half longitudinally. Unlike the equator, there are several prime meridians because several different methods have been used to find it.
Tropic of Cancer
Tropic of Capricorn
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Oxygen, zinc, helium
Iron, zinc, hydrogen
Carbon, hydrogen, oxygen
Carbs get a bad rap in the diet world, but they're essential for human life. They generate the fuel we need to metabolize food. There are many types of carbs, and they're broken down into simple and complex carbohydrates.
Helium and H2O
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Jist
Jyst
Gist
Gist is a noun that defines the substance of a text. If you understand the gist (soft g) of a story, you understand the main idea or underlying theme of the story. It doesn't mean you leaned the moral of the story.
Gyst
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"The Count of Monte Cristo"
"Fahrenheit 451"
This Ray Bradbury story is set in a dystopian future where books are illegal and firemen go around lighting books on fire. Paper burns at 451 degrees Fahrenheit, and that's where Bradbury got the title from.
"Antigone"
"A Brave New World"
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Impossible
Implausible
Very few things in life are impossible. Implausible means not likely or not reasonable. Impossible means not able to happen in any way. It's implausible to travel 500 mph in a car, but not impossible. It's impossible to travel faster than the speed of light in a car.
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Bill Clinton
Richard Nixon
Andrew Johnson
Andrew Johnson became president after Lincoln was assassinated, and although he was responsible for purchasing Alaska, he's most remembered for being impeached. He didn't want to follow through with Lincoln's wishes upon assuming office and that led to a lot of conflict.
George Washington
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321
227
118
There are 118 elements on the table and they are listed by atomic number. Hydrogen has atomic No.1 and it's the most abundant element in the universe. A hydrogen atom only has one proton in its nucleus. It's so light it easily escapes gravity unless it bonds to oxygen to form water (H2O).
79
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Stratosphere
Exosphere
Mesosphere
Lithosphere
The five layers of the atmosphere are the troposhpere, stratosphere, mesosphere, thermosphere and exosphere. The exosphere is closest to space and toposphere is closest to the Earth's crust. The ozone layer is in the stratosphere.
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Real nucleus additive
Ribonucleic acid
If you know what DNA stands for, you probably know RNA. It stands for ribonucleic acid, and along with DNA, it's present in all living things. It's an essential acid, but unlike DNA, it isn't a double helix. It is usually a single, folded strand.
Reconstructed nucleic acid
Really new acid
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Hireoglyphics
Hieroglyphics
"Hieroglyphics" is an "i before e" word and they are similar to today's emojis. There are close to 3,000 emojis being used regularly and there were about 700 hieroglyphics in the Ancient Egyptian alphabet.
Heiroglyphics
Hyroglyphics
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Zeus
Oedipus Rex
The "Oedipus Cycle" consists of three stories written by Sophocles and most Americans are taught the story when they first enter high school. The overall themes of the story are fate and destiny. The books date back to 400 BC.
Achilles
Perseus
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Famous
Infamous
To be famous means to be known by a lot of people, but to be infamous or notorious means to be famous for a bad reason. A career criminal might be notorious, or an entire city might be notorious for its levels of crime.
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Cleisthenes
Cleisthenes is considered the father of democracy, since he instituted democratic ideals in Athens in 508 BC. The move came following the overthrow of a tyrant king. The new democracy promised equality for all citizens.
Zeus
Socrates
Plato
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Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan was the 40th U.S. president and served two terms from 1981 to 1989. His economic initiative came to be known as Reaganomics. Before becoming president, he was governor of California, and before that he was a Hollywood actor.
Bill Clinton
Jimmy Carter
George W. Bush
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Solid
Liquid
The outer core is the only layer of Earth to be in a liquid state. It is about 1,500 miles thick, and made of molten iron and nickel registering up to 7,500 degrees Fahrenheit. When the Earth spins, the liquid outer core is able to flow around the solid inner core.
Gas
None of the above
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Grass
Seed
Fire
Fire requires oxygen to survive, but that doesn't make it a living thing. Clouds, water and rain are other natural things that are non-living but are sometimes mistaken for living things. A seed is a living thing in a dormant state.
Moss
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Guruu
Guroo
Guru
A guru is a spiritual teacher, but it can also define any teacher or expert on a subject. A company might hire a sales guru to talk to the sales team one day, or you may travel to India to study Hinduism under a spiritual guru.
Gooroo
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"Great Expectations"
"A Brave New World"
"The Odyssey"
"1984"
Ninth-grade literature has no shortage of dystopian novels, and this may be the most famous of them all. George Orwell's classic was published in 1949 and eerily predicted many of the privacy, data and language issues of today.
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Allude
Elude
To elude means to avoid something by use of cleverness. It can be interchanged with the word "avoid," but you don't need to use trickery to avoid anything, you just have to ignore it, so the words are slightly different. To allude means to mention something indirectly.
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Freedom of speech
Freedom of press
Freedom of choice
The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is the main law that separates America from many other world powers, and it's probably the country's most powerful law. Freedom of choice is not defined in the amendment.
Freedom of religion
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James Madison
During the War of 1812, British forces sacked Washington, D.C. and burned everything they could. President Madison fled and instructed his wife (who later instructed her slaves) to save valuables from the White House before it burnt.
James Monroe
Thomas Jefferson
John Adams
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True
If you want to remember the order of the planets, you should create an acronym. The correct acronym is: MVEMJSUN. You can make that mean whatever you want. A common one is: "My very excellent mom just served us noodles."
False
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