For the Little Chemist in Your Life

The American Chemical Society has a cool website called Chemistry.org which offers activities (both experiments and crafts), interviews with working chemists (in a Flat Stanley kind of way) and other information in a elementary school kid-friendly format.

For older kids, the ACS offers a magazine called ChemMatters, "Demystifying everyday chemistry for high school students and teachers for over 23 years." The site offers free teacher's guides in Word or PDF format. You can also get the last 20 years worth of magazines on CD for $25! The April 2006 issue features the following stories: (click the link for a pdf sample version including "oil and water don't mix," "The dog at my homework," "Biomimicry," and the links page):

"In the April 2006 Issue...

Question From the Classroom
why do water and oil not mix?

ChemSumer 4
The Dog Ate My Homework and Other Gut-Wrenching Tales
Midge, a fun-loving dalmation has a taste for paper. When she eats $180 in cash and checks, can it be recovered?

Sneeze and Wheeze 7
Learning how allergic reactions occur is often the key to living with and controlling the misery they create.

Bling Zinger ... The Lead Content of Jewelry 11
Could your jewelry make you sick? For one small child, the answer is yes.

GreenChem
Biomimcry — Where Chemistry Lessons Come Naturally 15
From spiders to beetles to mussels, some chemists turn to nature for inspiration.

Nanomotors 18
Some synthetic and others natural, these tiny motors are similar to the motors in your favorite household appliances.

Chem.matters.links 20"

I went ahead and ordered a year's subscription for Xavier--at $14 it's hard to beat the price--and hopefully it will allow him to "keep his scientific knowledge balanced" while he's studying astronomy this year. LOL Now I've got to go read my sample issue...

ALSO, for the more experienced chemistry student, there's a cool experiment in Popular Science where you can make nylon fiber in your own home!