Update: Wow! A digital thermometer for $12.99! The range is phenomenal: -40-450 F. You’ll have to convert to Celsius. I use hot plates ($10.26) to heat borosilicate or Pyrex beakers with solutions. Much safer than Bunsen burners.
Update: I went on a fact-finding trip to Dollar Tree. There is a full complement of Epsom salts, hydrogen peroxide, tea candles, and rubbing alcohol. The one I visited in WV had six packs of paint palettes in the Toys aisle. These are useful for chemical reactions as reaction plates. I’ll let you know how they hold up. Each pack has six palettes. I bought magnifiers to use for stream studies and optics labs. While I was in WV, I went to a Mennonite grocery outlet, Weaver’s. This is a terrific place to find food coloring, alum, cream of tartar, etc. at discount prices. Ollie’s is another good place to shop for discount goods for lab. If you have an independent hardware store, it’s a good place to buy copper sulfate (blue stone or root killer), plaster of Paris for chalk, and gallons of white glue for slime.
Update: I was at Walmart and checked prices. Yeast is $1.79 for three packets and four pounds of Epsom salts are $2.86. Hydrogen peroxide and rubbing alcohol are $0.88 each. Browse the clearance aisle, too. Look at these simple science tools: balance, cylinder, test tube rack, magnifier, and specimen box. I especially like the balance and milk carton test tube rack. This thermometer is $3.48.
Microspirit burner is a tiny alcohol burner. Generally, I use tea candles to heat reagents.
Look at this microtitration assembly. I think the syringe can control the drops more accurately than with pipette alone.
Can you equip a chemistry lab in your home for $100? I’m talking about a bare bones lab. But, your child deserves to try a variety of lab experiments. I put together a list of materials, chemical supplies, and labs.
First, locate a cassette case, clothes pin (test tube holder), iron nails, steel wool, sand paper, transparency sheets, yogurt cups, soda can, glass jars, plastic bottles, CDs, q-tips, craft sticks, and plastic spoons. Drinking straws and blister packs from gum can be used for small scale reactions. A soda can, cork, and pin convert to a calorimeter to measure calories in food. A paper towel tube and CD convert into a spectroscope.
Equipment:
Medicine droppers $4.33 (reuse instead of plastic pipettes)
Digital scale $8.33
Cupcake liners $1.00 (weigh paper)
Coffee filters $1.00 (dollar store)
Tea candles $1.00 (heat solutions)
Paint palettes (6) $4.20 (reaction plates)
Toothpicks $1.00 (Walmart or dollar store) (stir sticks)
Graduated cylinders $4.97
Test tubes and rack $7.99
Small funnels (2) $1.00 ( Walmart)
Thermometer $5 (glass) or (metal $3.55)
Plastic syringe $2
Total: $41.82
Chemicals:
Salt $0.50 (dollar store)
Sodium bicarbonate $0.50 (baking soda)
Sodium carbonate $4.10 ( washing soda)
Isopropyl alcohol $1 (dollar store) (rubbing alcohol)
Magnesium sulfate $1 (dollar store) (Epsom salts)
Hydrogen peroxide $1 (dollar store)
Calcium chloride $5.42 (Driveway Heat)
Dish soap $1 (dollar store)
Total: 45.70
Labs
Make pH test strips. (This lab requires red cabbage. I use the household items on hand: apple juice, lemon juice, vinegar, salt in water,
Precipitate Reaction (This lab uses Epsom salts and washing soda and a piece of Ivory soap.
Chemical Reactions (Make red cabbage indicator solution to substitute for Universal indicator.)
What’s new, CO2?
Hydrate Lab
Penny Density Lab
Green Pennies Lab
Trading Places
Chemical Reactions (Make red cabbage indicator solution to substitute for Universal indicator.)
What’s new, CO2?
Hydrate Lab
Penny Density Lab
Green Pennies Lab
Trading Places
Charles Lae Lab (Use large yogurt cups as beakers. The 10 mL oral syringe works better than a 30 mL syringe.)
Why no metal containers? (Koolaid and steel wool)
Why no metal containers? (Koolaid and steel wool)
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