For chemistry, I know it's pretty impressive to drop a small lump of sodium into a beaker of water that has an acid/base indicator in solution.. for one thing the sodium will bust into flames and the water will turn whatever color indicates a strong base... Best as a demo for safety reasons, of course.
For structural engineering, have participants build the tallest free standing tower with just one sheet of paper and no more than a total of something like a yard of tape. Cutting of both allowed.
anything that glows, or involves electricity.. Tesla coils, that sort of thing.. lasers and optics.. Natural gas in soap bubbles make an impressive flare...
How about presentations on genetics, molecular biology, cellular machinery, and how it relates to the growing field of nanotechnology.What would teenagers want to see in a science show?
light magnesium, they'll love it cuz it goes so bright...
don't know what else...
all you got to do is turn them on to the great Electrical Engineer Nikola Tesla tell them about the philidelphia experimen (project rainbow) ie time travel Tesla's Death ray etc and while your telling them about the cool sci-fi stuff he did and conceived of you can slip in all the everyday inventions he invented such a radio controll, A\C electricity and how he invented radio communications and that he sent a radio signal around the world years before marcony sent one across the atlantic (even though marcony used 17 of Tesla's patents to do it) it will show them that sometimes the greatest mind get shoved aside and forgotten about just like most grade 8's get shoved aside and forgotten about.
If you do your research on good ole Nikola you can find a S**t load of intriguing, controvesial and plain cool stuff and experiments to show the kids and trust me if you do it right they will all stay interested in Science for the rest of there lives.
It worked for me.
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