Easy Science Experiments for Kids

Each of these has a genuinely unknown answer at the start, which is what separates an experiment from a demonstration. The prediction step is not optional; it is the part where the thinking happens.

Which things float

Predict first: line up ten objects and have everyone guess. Then: a bowl of water. The interesting bit: heavy things that float and light things that sink break the obvious rule, and the child has to build a better one. A ball of foil sinks; the same foil as a boat floats.

Red cabbage indicator

Boil chopped red cabbage, keep the purple water. Add lemon juice, bicarbonate of soda, vinegar, soap. Predict which will turn which colour before starting. Pink is acid, green or blue is alkaline. Children can then test everything in the kitchen, which is the actual activity.

Skittles or sweets in water

Arrange coloured sweets round the rim of a plate, pour warm water into the middle. The colours run inward and stop at clean lines. Predict what happens when the colours meet. They do not mix, which surprises everybody and is worth pursuing.

Which paper aeroplane

Make three designs. Predict the winner. Fly each three times and measure, because one throw proves nothing. This is where the idea of a fair test arrives naturally: same person, same spot, same effort.

The dissolving race

Sugar in cold, warm and hot water, and stirred against unstirred. Predict the order. Change one thing at a time, which is the whole of experimental design in one activity.

Growing towards light

Two identical seedlings, one in a box with a hole cut in one side. Over a week the plant bends. Predict what it will do and why. Slow experiments are worth including because most real science is slow.

Ice melting on different surfaces

Identical ice cubes on metal, wood, plastic, a plate, a towel. Predict the order. Metal feels cold and melts ice fastest, which is a genuine puzzle for a child and leads somewhere real.

The eggshell and vinegar

An egg in vinegar for two days loses its shell and becomes rubbery. Predict what will be left. Slow, dramatic, and it introduces the idea that something can dissolve while something else remains.

How to run any of them

Predict out loud and commit to it. Change one thing at a time. Repeat it, because one result is not a result. And treat a wrong prediction as the good outcome, which it is: you learned something.

An experiment that confirms what everybody expected is the least interesting possible result, and children should be told so.