Acids & Bases,   |   Crystals   |   Heat & Cold   |   Household Chemicals  |   Edible Food Experiments  |  

See also: Forensic Chemistry

Chemistry is frequently defined as the study of the nature, properties, and composition of matter, and how these undergo changes. Chemistry is the science of the materials that make up our physical world. It is a vast field which includes subdivisions organic, inorganic, analytical, and physical chemistry.

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Cabbage Juice - pH Indicator - Make your own acid/base indicator by boiling red cabbage. Use the juice to pH-test different fluids.

Backyard Chemistry Experiments - Test the pH of various water samples, such as pool water, tap water, bottled water, pond water, fish tank water using a pool kit capable of testing pH and various water samples.

Acid Rain Experiments - Start with learning how to measure the pH of common substances, and then move on to determining the amount of acid in soil and streams.

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Crystal Gardens - Crystals are not alive, but they can grow. Growing crystals requires a little time and patience. If you have both (plus a few other ingredients), you can grow your own crystal gardens. Made with Mrs. Stewart's Liquid Bluing.

Crystal Ornament - Whether it's Christmas time or not, Borax crystals are easy tocreate and lovely to look at.

Mrs. Stewart's Bluing Original Magic Salt Crystal Garden - Mrs. Stewart's Bluing is a colloidal suspension of extremely minute particles of blue powder (Ferric Hexacyanoferrate). You can order bluing or the whole kit on this website, if you wish.

Crystal Growing Made Easy - Growing crystals is a slow and careful process because the crystals grow by adding single layers of molecules. The crystal shape reflects the basic patterns by which the molecules of the crystal build up.

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Dry Ice Experiments - Experimenting with Dry Ice is interesting and enjoyable. We have compiled a list of our favorite Dry Ice experiments that are easy to do. From Rock-It Science.

Flame Tests - You can be an analytical chemist or forensic scientist in this activity, by finding out what color flames different metals make, and working out the identity of some unknown metal solutions.

Steel Wool Generating Heat - Chemical reactions occur every day all around us. A chemical reaction is a process where one type of substance is chemically converted to another substance.

Heat - The demonstrations in this chapter present special hazards, since most involve very hot or extremely cold substances, volatile chemicals, fragile glassware, high pressure gases or evacuated containers.

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Make a Chemical Reaction - A chemical reaction is any process where one kind of "substance" is chemically converted to a different kind of substance. These reactions happen all around us. And you can make one happen right now!

Countertop Chemistry - Chemistry activities that use chemicals you can find at the grocery or the hardware store.

ChemMystery - Try to solve a murder using simple chemistry experiments you can do at home. Lawrence Hall of Science, Berkeley, CA.

Classic Chemistry Experiments - A 'book' in Acrobat and Word format with descriptions of 100 classic chemistry experiments.

Alka Seltzer Student Science Experiments - The familiar fizzing you hear when you drop an Alka-Seltzer tablet into a glass of water is the result of a chemical reaction. It's also the perfect tool for demonstrating some very nifty science principles.

The Chemistry of Dyeing: Reactive Dyes - How does tie-dying work anyways? Why does the dye stick permanently to cotton material? For big and little kids.

Creative Chemistry - There are full-colour worksheets and teaching notes for fun activities suitable for a chemistry club, and around three hundred pages of question sheets and practical guides for GCSE and A Level Chemistry.

Diapers: The Inside Story - All polymers aren't goopey like putty. The polymer inside some super absorbent diapers looks like a powder. When you add water to this amazing powder you will see why this polymer is used in baby diapers!

Electrochemistry Experiments - These fun and simple experiments can teach the fundamental concepts of Electrochemistry without asking much of the student.

The Exploratorium Science Snacks About Chemistry - Bubbles, making a fog chamber, why milk makes some people sick, how taste works, and more.

Silly Putty Recipe - A silly putty-like substance which is fun to make and play with.

Home Experiments - Learn how to make a can collapse or make a balloon fireproof. From Professor Shakhashiri.

Kitchen Chemistry - Explore this virtual kitchen and perform online experiments to solve a puzzle and get a reward. To see The Virtual Kitchen, you'll need a plug-in called Flash. From PBS.

Soap Chemistry - To understand what is needed to achieve effective cleaning, it is helpful to have a basic knowledge of soap and detergent chemistry.

Stain Removal From Washable Fabrics - Sharon Stevens explains practical household uses of chemicals to remove stains from various sources.

Make Stuff - Formulas for lotions, potions, concoctions and remedies you can make at home.

Making Soap You Can Use - Those textbook experiments are no good. Using this simple method you can make a real bar of soap. It's quite alkaline at first, so I warn my kids not to wash their face, but after a couple of weeks it becomes less dangerous (and gets harder).

Potential Hazards in Your Home - A lesson plan for a high school-level experiment identifying household chemicals and understanding their possible effects.

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Chemistry of Cakes - Learn the three important stages to making a perfect cake.

A Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe for Chemists - See if you can decipher this one. The following recipe for chocolate chip cookies appeared in Chemical & Engineering News (June 19, 1995). It was attributed to Jeannene Ackerman. Enjoy!

Glue From Milk - Called casein glue. This adhesive is the result of milk solids being separated from the liquid. These solids, the curds, dry to form a hard plastic like substance.

Chemistry 101 for Pound Cakes - Get a fun explanation of what is really happening when baking a cake to perfection.

Testing for Starch - Many substances change color due to chemical reactions with other substances. For example, iodine will turn blue when it combines with starch.

Water to Wine - Learn the science behind the magicans "water to wine" trick.

Kitchen Chemistry - Here you can learn more about the science behind cooking and how it affects the way that we perceive taste and flavour.

Making Invisible Ink Appear - Using milk, baking soda, lemon juice or other food sources to make invisible ink. Which works best?

Soda Can Cannon - This is a fun experiment, relying on pressure inside a plastic bottle to shoot a cork several dozen feet into the air. Parental supervision is recommended.

The Sugar Cube Page - Includes The burning sugar cube trick and The floating sugar cube trick.

Cabbage Juice pH Indicator - Make your own acid/base indicator by boiling red cabbage. Use the juice to pH-test different fluids.

Sunkist Kids Experiments - From Sunkist experiments and recipes using oranges and lemons.

Twinkies Test - A humorous series of experiments designed to determine the properties of the Twinkie.

Dancing Raisins - Create dancing raisins of your own with this little experiment.