Elementary School Students: Simple One-Day Science Project and Craft Ideas
For elementary school summer break projects and crafts, we recommend starting with something your child is already interested in.
When it’s something they like, they can enjoy working on it.
Here, we introduce simple ideas for elementary school students! These are experiments and crafts you can do in a single day.
The materials are things you already have at home or can get quickly, so even if you’re short on time, no worries.
Perfect for those who are “stuck on a theme” or “looking for an easy and fun project”! Find your favorite and give it a try.
- Simple yet amazing crafts: craft ideas that elementary school students will want to make
- For summer vacation homework! Simple and amazing crafts for elementary school students that you’ll want to make after seeing them
- Recommended for elementary school students! Science fair topics & craft ideas
- For upper-grade boys! Simple yet awesome craft project [Don’t call it lazy]
- Simple but awesome! Craft ideas for upper-grade girls
- DIY science projects that elementary school boys will love: ideas you can make with everyday materials
- Simple and cute summer project crafts! A collection of ideas for girls that will make you want to create
- Fun crafts using straws
- [Middle School Students] Easy One-Day Science Projects and Crafts Ideas
- Recommended Independent Research Projects for 5th Graders [Elementary School Students]
- Recommended for lower elementary school students! A collection of plastic bottle craft ideas made with everyday materials.
- Paper cup crafts that elementary school kids will love! A collection of fun project ideas
- Toys you can make from cardboard crafts! Authentic ideas you can build and play with
[Elementary School] Simple One-Day Science Projects and Crafts (31–40)
Plastic Bottle Cap Calendar
In the old days, when the year-end approached, we used to receive calendars from the local shopping street and neighborhood stores, and our house would overflow with more calendars than we needed.
Now it’s an era where we buy calendars to suit our purposes.
For a summer project, you can make a perpetual calendar using plastic bottle caps—depending on your ideas, it could turn out to be a wonderful calendar.
The materials are a corkboard, pushpins, and plastic bottle caps.
The basic setup is to fix the days of the week—Sun, Mon, Tue, and so on—on the corkboard, and then line up bottle caps labeled with the dates.
Think of hooking them onto large-headed pushpins.
You’re free to decorate the bottle caps with beads or even make them light up with miniature bulbs—the ideas are limitless.
Take the whole summer to create a lovely calendar!
supercooled water
This is an experiment using supercooled water that you can easily do with a plastic bottle and a liquid.
When you pour supercooled water onto a dish, the liquid rapidly turns into ice, overturning the common belief that water freezes at 0°C or below.
You can find instructions for making supercooled water online, and it can be made with various liquids, making it a perfect experiment for a summer vacation science project.
Let’s make a craft with aluminum foil
Have fun like you would with clay—try making creations out of aluminum foil! Since it’s not clay, your hands won’t get dirty, making it easy and entertaining.
All you need is aluminum foil.
First, take as much as you think you’ll need and roll it into a ball.
Don’t decide what you’re making in advance; it’s more fun to pinch and twist the foil, change the shape, and let strange creatures emerge from whatever forms appear.
You can add more foil, paint it, or decorate it—enjoy creating your own original pieces freely, just like an artist.
It’s a great open-ended project!
Let’s remake it!
This is a free-study project where an ordinary, very colorful chair is unexpectedly remade with a vintage look.
It’s a serious guide that introduces various paints, tools, and techniques, but what’s wonderful is that you can buy the materials at a home improvement store and refresh items you’ve grown tired of.
It might also be fun to freely and boldly play around with remaking things together with your child.
Floating Vegetables, Sinking Vegetables
Wagyan, a character nostalgic for the Famicom generation, introduces an experiment on “vegetables that float in water and vegetables that sink.” Strangely, some vegetables feel heavy in your hand but float in water, while others feel light yet sink.
There’s a rule that explains these two patterns of vegetables, so try thinking about it together as a family.
There are exceptions, but experiment with many kinds of vegetables while making predictions.
[Elementary School] Easy One-Day Independent Research & Craft Ideas (41–50)
What happens if you microwave soap?
A simple experiment you can try right away if you have bar soap lying around at home or in your stock: what happens when you microwave soap? Put a bar of soap in the microwave and turn it on—you’ll be amazed by the fun sight! You can still use the soap afterward, so report on how it feels to use.
You might also capture the changing shape in a video or photos as it heats in the microwave.
It’s an experiment recommended from an ecology and SDGs perspective as well.
Fun-to-shake shaker
Here’s a fun shaker made from a plastic wrap core.
Use origami made of film.
Wrap double-sided tape around the core and seal one end with the origami.
From the other side, add beads or similar fillings and seal it the same way with origami.
Wrap washi tape around it, then cut the origami into strips and wrap them on.
Add googly-eye stickers and a mouth to finish! It’s fun to dance with to music, too.
Little kids will enjoy it, so be sure to make it together and have a great time!
