You need safety goggles, a metric ruler, scissors, a clear drinking glass or lab beaker, assorted colored pen and marker sets with both soluble and insoluble inks, a stirring rod longer than the opening of the glass or beaker, a paper clip, an eyedropper, liquid solvents (such as filtered or distilled water, ammonia, nail polish remover and rubbing alcohol), a timer and a stopwatch. You also need a specialized product -- chromatography paper -- an example is Filter Paper No. 1 from Whatman Laboratory. This project needs to be adult supervised at all times. Keep the solvents away from heat or open flames, and do not inhale the vapors of the solvents. Wear eye protection at all times when working with solvents.
Measure the height of the glass. Put 2 to 3 cm of water into the glass. Cut a strip of chromatography paper 2 cm longer than the glass height, by 3 cm wide. Use a black, water-soluble marker to draw a line across the strip, 2 inches from one end. Hold the strip next to the glass and wrap the remaining end of the strip around the stirring rod enough times that 1-cm of the lined end will be below the water line. Secure the wrapped end with the paper clip. Carefully lower the strip into the glass, laying the stirring rod across the mouth of the glass. Set the timer for five minutes. The water will travel up the strip by capillary action, and will carry the ink's pigments with it. The pigments will travel at different rates based on their molecular weight, chemical reactivity and size of the molecules.
Run chromatograms to compare various color water-soluble markers from the same manufacturer. You saw that black is actually composed of several different colors. What colors combine to form colors of the other markers? Record your results and allow the paper strips to dry for use in your presentation. Try using non-water soluble markers and pens. Repeat using the other solvents. Do all solvents work with all inks? Use a stopwatch to measure the rate at which the solvents and various pigments rise up the strip.
For this fun investigation, you need either four or more black pens of various brands, or four or more blue pens of various brands, and the supplies for running chromatograms. Choose one pen to belong to the perpetrator of a crime, and run a chromatograph on the ink from this pen, allowing enough time for the strip to dry. Make up a murder mystery story where a mark from an ink pen is the only evidence left behind. Give each suspect (person involved in your murder mystery) one of the pens without telling him what it is for. Gather everyone together, and relate the story that someone in the room is the murderer, and you will use special "CSI" skills to solve the crime. Ask each suspect for his pen, remembering to whom each one belongs. Run chromatographs on each pen. Produce the previously completed strip and compare it to those that were just run. The matching strip identifies the killer!