When selecting a science fair project for your student, make sure that it captures their interest. This will enable them to demonstrate greater excitement for their experiment when presenting and will keep them interested throughout the entire process.
Investigate shampoo’s properties with this engaging chemistry experiment! Conduct an investigation to see if caffeine increases typing speed or create an eye-catching optical illusion that’s sure to amaze.
Rube Goldberg Machine
Rube Goldberg machines are inventive devices designed to perform simple tasks. To begin designing one of your own, identify what tasks it should complete – anything from switching on a light switch to popping balloons and sending Hot Wheels cars down ramps can all qualify.
Make use of any materials at hand – such as ping pong balls and leftover toilet paper rolls – so your students can create and test machines, helping to develop problem-solving skills while also encouraging socialization and teamwork. Perhaps even witness students compete in a Rube Goldberg Machine competition at school or local science fair!
UV Beads
Students use UV Beads to learn about the Sun’s invisible ultraviolet radiation that causes skin damage and even contributes to ozone depletion. These beads appear white under ordinary visible lighting but change color under UV light exposure before returning back to white upon being taken out of UV exposure.
Ask students to use beads as part of an experiment using various types of light sources–incandescent bulbs, halogen lights, fluorescent lighting or colored theatrical film–to understand how each affects color change. Students could also use the beads for chemical reaction experiments to explore temperature effects on how quickly beads lose color over time.
Optical Illusions
An optical illusion is any visual phenomenon that deviates from reality, produced when our eyes send information to our brain, which attempts to interpret this through shapes, lines, or colors.
However, sometimes this process goes awry and your brain fills in spaces that do not exist with an image that does not correspond with reality – giving rise to illusions.
There are three primary categories of illusions: literal, physiological and cognitive. Physiological illusions result from overstimulation of one stimulus (brightness, tilt angle, color or movement) leading to misinterpretations of reality; these can include images like Cafe Wall which appears to move but is actually stationary as well as Ponzo illusion.
Fertilizer Runoff
Plants require nutrients similar to humans for proper growth and yield, though not all types of soil provide the essential components. Fertilizers may help boost plant health and yield; however, excess amounts can wash away into waterways via runoff, polluting both groundwater sources as well as local bodies of water with contaminants; excess amounts may feed algae blooms which deplete oxygen from lake or river waters creating lifeless zones known as dead zones. They may even decompose into nitrogen oxide (NO), an extremely potent greenhouse gas which contributes greatly towards climate change.
Newton’s Cradle
Newton’s Cradle is a well-known demonstration that illustrates the principles of conservation of energy and momentum through swinging balls. Created by English actor Simon Prebble in 1967, this device bears his name to pay homage to British scientist Isaac Newton; although Newton himself wasn’t involved with its creation.
When the first ball is pulled and released it collides with the next one transferring all its energy into it; that second ball then transfers all its energy onto a third one which causes it to swing upward. This demonstration serves to illustrate action-reaction laws as well as helping students understand friction.
Candle Relighting
Have you ever watched a magician at a party perform an illusion where they blow out a candle, hold their lighter to the smoke, then suddenly the candle lights back up again? Did you know it has some cool science behind it?
Heat from a candle flame vaporizes liquid wax near the wick and draws it upwards through capillary action, whereupon its reaction with oxygen produces heat and light, creating water vapor and carbon dioxide as by-products – this is how smoke comes from candles!
Lung Capacity
The lung capacity experiment provides students with an engaging way to investigate air pressure and fluid properties. They can measure tidal volume, minute volume, functional residual capacity and total lung capacity by employing this exciting experiment.
Kids can put various household items to the test as egg catchers or check whether different paper airplane shapes fly further using this project by Julian Trubin. They can even try their hand at forensic science with this fingerprint classifier experiment on HubPages!
Experiments using dry ice are always captivating, and this one serves to teach both chemical reactions and engineering design. With its vast options for water testing, this kit opens up even further opportunities for future experiments.