TOP 10 BEST SCIENCE EXPERIMENTS FOR KIDS
Science, and the scientific method, are just ways of describing what is happening in the world around us. So while a kid interested in the subject might have fun with STEM toys and science kits, you don't need to go out and buy something special to keep the STEM learning going home. You probably have most of the materials you need for these science experiments for kids sitting around in cupboards and drawers. So, next time you need a boredom-busting indoor activity on a rainy day or a DIY project to keep them busy, pull out one of these ideas and get them to start making hypotheses.
1. Apple Oxidation
What works best for keeping an apple from turning brown? Test to find out! Slice up an apple, and let each slice soak in a different liquid. Then take them out, lay them on a tray, and check the brownness after three, six, and so on. This tests the properties of different liquids and helps students practice the scientific method if they create hypotheses about which liquids would be most effective.
2. Eggshells VS Beverages
This one will really get them into brushing their teeth once they scientifically prove all the good things that toothpaste can do.
Write on sticky notes: Soda 1, Soda 2, Juice 1, and Juice 2. Place them in a row on a counter.
Fill two glasses halfway with brown soda and place behind the Soda 1 and Soda 2 sticky notes. Fill two glasses halfway with lemon juice and place behind the Juice 1 and Juice 2 sticky notes.
Carefully place one egg in the bowl. Squeeze a big dollop — about one tablespoon — of toothpaste on top of the egg and gently rub the toothpaste all around with your hands until the egg is completely covered in a thick layer of toothpaste. Repeat with a second egg.
Gently submerge the toothpaste-covered eggs into the liquids: one egg in the glass labeled Soda 1 and the other egg in the glass labeled Juice 1. Wash and dry your hands.
Gently submerge the remaining eggs, without toothpaste on them, in the remaining glasses: one in the glass labeled Soda 2 and the other in the glass of juice labeled Juice 2. Wash and dry your hands. Leave the eggs in the glasses for 12 hours.
After 12 hours, remove the eggs from the glasses of soda one at a time. Rinse them in cool water and pat them dry with a towel. Place each egg on the sticky note of the glass it was in. Are the eggs the same or different colors?
Remove the eggs from the glasses of juice one at a time. Rinse them under the faucet and pat them dry. Place each egg on the sticky note of the glass it was in. Feel the eggs gently. Does one feel stronger or weaker than the other?
Write down your observations in your science notebook.
The eggshells in this experiment represent your teeth' enamel (outer coating). Toothpaste cleans your teeth and prevents stains, removing food and drink particles stuck on your teeth. Teeth can be stained easily by dark-colored liquids like cola, coffee, or tea. The egg without toothpaste will be brown and discolored. The egg covered in toothpaste was protected from turning brown.
Toothpaste also protects your pearly whites from decay (breaking down). The egg without toothpaste left in the lemon juice was worn down and soft to the touch, while the egg that was protected with toothpaste is stronger. The lemon juice is acidic, and those acids broke down the shell just as acidic drinks can wear away your tooth enamel. When a tooth is worn down, a cavity can form more easily. But the fluoride in toothpaste mixes with your saliva to create a protective coating around your tooth enamel. It helps keep your teeth strong and cavity-free.
3. Coffee Ground Fossils
By making a salt dough with coffee grounds and pressing various shapes into it (toy dinosaur feet, seashells), kids can better understand how fossils are made. If you poke a hole in the top before it dries, the kids can hang their "fossils" up in their rooms.
4. Chromatography Flowers
Chromatography is the process of separating a solution into different parts — like the pigments in ink used in markers. If you draw stripes around a coffee filter, then fold it up and dip the tip in water, the water will travel up the filter and separate the marker ink into its different pigments (in astonishing patterns that you can display as a craft project). This family made the end result even brighter by adding an LED circuit to the center.
5. Water Walking
You'll need six containers of water for this one: three with clear water, one with red food coloring, one with blue coloring, and one with yellow coloring. Arrange them in a circle, alternating colored and clear containers, and make bridges between the containers with folded paper towels. Your kids will be amazed to see the colored water "walk" over the bridges and into the clear containers, mixing colors and giving them a first-hand look at the magic of capillarity.
6. Sunscreen Test
This experiment puts the A (art) in STEAM: Paint different designs on construction paper with different sunscreens, leave the papers out in the sun and compare the results. Then, hang your "conclusions" on your fridge.
7. Magic Milk
Put a few drops of food coloring in a shallow bowl of milk, and they'll stay that way — as self-contained blobs. But add a little dish soap to a toothpick or a Q-tip and touch the food coloring, and the colors will swirl around on their own like magic. It all has to do with surface tension: At first, the food coloring stays on the surface, but the soap causes a chemical reaction that breaks the surface tension.
8. Grow Crystals
Bend pipe cleaners into fun shapes, and watch them grow crystals when left overnight in a Borax solution. (Words of warning: Adults should handle Borax, and kids need to understand that the end result is not candy, even though it looks like it could be.)
9. Solar Oven
Use a DIY backyard solar oven to teach kids about solar power and sustainability. Note: While a solar oven can cook (and gets very hot!), for food safety reasons, you might want to stay away from solar oven-baked treats and use it for something else instead, as melting crayon ends into rainbow crayons.
10. Gravity-Defying Magnets
Hang paperclips from a ruler or dowel, and they dangle, as they should, because of gravity. But you can show kids how other forces can overcome gravity by putting strong magnets on a ruler and using them to get the paperclips to stand straight up.
Summary
These kid-friendly experiments cover magnetism, surface tension, astronomy, chemistry, magnetism — you name it — and in ways that let kids really see how the forces around us work. As always, safety counts: wear goggles and coats or aprons if need be (sometimes kids get a kick out of how scientific the protective gear makes them look), and always make sure that the kids are supervised when doing them.