5th grade students can use projects as an effective way of exploring science concepts through hands-on experiments and investigations, while creative ideas can increase curiosity and engagement.
With this simple experiment using a jar of vinegar and balloon filled with baking soda, students will gain an understanding of density as well as gravity and force interactions.
1. Static Electricity
Children learning physics, biology and chemistry through science fair projects that include making something like an interactive volcano that really erupts or balloon races with cars that win are having great fun while taking part in these engaging and immersive activities. Fifth graders especially find these projects to be extremely engaging!
Static electricity experiments help students better comprehend how objects attract or repel each other due to positive and negative electrical charges on them. Students can rub a balloon against various materials to see which generate the most static, as well as build an electroscope to test various materials’ ability to create static before using said electroscope to identify which materials conduct electricity.
Students can create lemon batteries to learn the inner workings of batteries. To do this, they will require several 6-inch lengths of plastic-coated wire, two copper nails and one zinc nail.
2. Jumping Marshmallows
Hands-on experiments are among the best ways to promote learning and develop curiosity about science. This collection of 5th grade science fair projects features activities that explore biology, chemistry, physics and more!
Explore how acidity affects chalk in this Earth science experiment! This fun yet exciting chemistry experiment provides great opportunities to teach basic chemical principles.
Make use of marshmallows to test various recipes and observe how different cooking temperatures affect taste, texture, melt time and hardness. Split taste-testing volunteers into gender and age categories (if applicable) to investigate any gender/age related influences on taste and texture preferences.
This engaging yet simple project provides students with a fun way to understand the laws of motion. This take on classic catapult design is much less fiddly and more stable than its stick counterpart, making it suitable for younger students to manipulate.
3. Water Purification
Water purification is the practice of making drinking water safe for human consumption. By using coffee filters, sand, and gravel filters as examples of filter materials that remove contaminants from their supply of drinking water, students can gain knowledge on the process.
Divide the class into teams and assign each a role for this activity (such as materials manager, science recorder or engineering builder) within each team. Explain that each team will work for “Clear Water Environmental Engineering Company” to design a water filtration system to clean a sample of polluted water into clean drinking water.
Direct each team to create a water filter system from the materials provided, then test their filter by measuring its volume before and after filtering to see if its water becomes purer with each round of filtration.
4. Mini Trampoline
By fifth grade, kids are ready for exciting hands-on science experiments that engage their curiosity and foster an eagerness for learning. STEM challenges for 5th graders make studying biology, physics and chemistry engagingly fun!
Strengthen kids’ building skills while exploring gravity through this fun STEM challenge! Plus, this experiment helps children understand potential and kinetic energy concepts!
Start kids exploring potential and kinetic energies with this engaging STEM challenge, which tests catapult construction using wood craft sticks to see what they can launch with it. Additionally, this simple experiment can foster engineering and structural engineering skills as they play out.
Watch as children’s eyes light up with amazement when they levitate a stick figure through this captivating STEM experiment that uses insolubility to teach density and buoyancy concepts.
5. Leakproof Bag
Children will be amazed at this simple science experiment that showcases polymer’s wonderful chemistry. Kids will feel like magicians poking sharp pencils through a bag filled with water without spilling out! (Safety note: only conduct this activity with students who can safely handle sharp tips like pencils or bamboo skewers.)
Combine physics and engineering to build a catapult that shoots an object based on counterweight, arm length, and shooting angle – this simple project helps kids learn acceleration and the laws of motion! Students investigate atmospheric pressure with DIY barometers that also teach them weather patterns; paper chromatography allows kids to observe black ink mixtures into individual colors to teach about solubility and intermolecular forces.