A literally cool and interesting project involves experimenting with dry ice. Dry ice is frozen carbon dioxide that actually sublimates (changes from a solid directly to a gas) as opposed to evaporating and melting like regular ice. Have your student perform various tests on the dry ice to see how it differs from regular ice. Have him observe the differences when heating the two kinds of ice on a skillet, when letting the ice sit on a surface like a table and what happens when you place the ice outside on a hot day. Make sure to provide your child with protective gloves for handling the dry ice.
It's difficult not to have a fascination with fire. As a result, your student may enjoy working with fire in his science fair project. This project can center on the phenomenon of fire not being able to exist without the presence of air. By using a glass bowl and a small candle, your student can examine how and why fire does not ignite without air. You can connect this experiment with the famous egg experiment, in which a lit piece of paper is placed in a glass jar. Then an egg is placed on top of the jar and is sucked as the fire inside goes out. Have your student attempt to explain why fire behaves in this way.
Kids love candy and there is a good chance that your child will enjoy a project that allows him to make it. Show your child that many different types of candy include the ingredient corn syrup. Explain that corn syrup is an interfering agent, but have him figure out what that means on his own. Create two batches of lollipops using the recipe on the Exploratorium page (Resource 1), one with corn syrup and one without. By observing the differences between the two batches, your student can determine how the interfering agent of corn syrup has affected the candy. From there, your student can determine how other ingredients in the lollipop recipe have affected the candy.
Different kids play video games for different reasons. Some play games just to waste some time and not think, while others play them to win. Have your child conduct a social experiment based on video games. Have him choose a game that has an easy, medium and hard setting and have him recruit a large sample set playing on each of the settings. Determine if kids are more likely to enjoy the game if they are winning of if they just enjoy playing. This can be accomplished by giving them a survey after playing and compiling the answers into a chart.