Many parents groan when comes the time to make science projects. Children tend to come up with great ideas from their imagination, and many of these ideas come with a price tag of some sort in one way or another. While there are many parents who bite the bullet and buy the expensive materials, giving the project a little bit of thought and more creative design could drive down the cost. Sometimes low cost is part of the project criteria to begin with! Given more thought, though, you can definitely come up with ways to make free science fair projects! 

If your child already has an idea for a project, work with it, if they do not have an idea with, help them come up with one. Helping them come up with the idea is one way you can make sure to come up with some free science fair projects! Many times both parent and child do not know where to begin, and the best advice anyone can give you is to always start with your child's textbook. Starting with your child's textbook make sure that you are choosing a project idea that is relevant to what your child has studied during the school year. You may also get project ideas from the textbook examples! 

More importantly, however, is you have to fully understand a scientific concept before creating the project. When you or your child fully understand a concept, you both can break it down to its simplest possible example or demonstration, and this will be your project! Chances are that the simplest example is pretty easy and cheap, or you will get ideas for free science fair projects from it! 

Now that you have your idea, the next step is how to make it free. It is really simple. You just have to use junk, or at least what you thought was junk. Free science fair projects always recycle old materials. Think about your project components, and what you need in order to create it. Next, look around your home. Go through old toys (these are usually the best because some old toys actually have simple machines or motors that can work for years, and these can go great with some science projects!) Go through your attic, basement, and garage. You are bound to find the things that you can use for the science project! If you are missing parts, ask your neighbors if they have junk items that may serve as the parts you need. 

To really make sure that you have free science fair projects, though, you can do the reverse of the method just described. Pull out all your junk first and then make a science project out of it. Seeing what you have to work with before even thinking of an idea is a good exercise of the imagination. The best part about it, though, is that you will never have to spend on your child's science projects again!