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I have a Levitron and it's cool. Think I'd rather have a Diamagnetic Levitation Device at that age though. Plenty of plans to make your own. Fun project.

The Mirage optical illusion is pretty amazing. I have it, and a Levitron, and while they're both really amazing for a while, there's not a lot of stuff to keep doing with them.

Those electronics kits from Radio Shack and other places with the resistors, diodes, etc and little springs and wires to use for breadboarding are pretty cool and educational. If he actually digs into those, it's pretty cheap to buy a real breadboard and a power supply and a bunch of real components and he can start making real stuff. If he graduates beyond the lessons in the book that comes with the electronics kit, pick him up a copy of Horowitz and Hill's The Art of Electronics, and let him get started with real stuff.

I think they're over your price range, but Lego Mindstorms are great.

You can always get him started with elementary computer programming. If "real" languages seem too challenging, HyperCard is great for starting programming, especially since pretty soon you start to find stuff you want to do but can't, and then find out that HyperTalk is a real programming language that you can start adding in piecemeal to your project, gradually learning programming.

If there are local scout troops, building and racing Pinewood Derby cars can be great if you get serious about going for either style or speed.

A basic model rocketry kit can be fun. It's cool to see it launch.

There are lots of cool science related toys/kits/gadgets here.

A monacle, white lab coat, and a faux German accent.

White?

That is not exactly true... Unfortunately, space around Earth is already full of junk and big particles that can wreck havoc on about anything that orbits us.
Also, there are many micro-sized meteorits and other space dust that will happily punch holes in anything that flies around (which makes long space flights nearly impossible)
And radiations...
And comets...
And stars...
And stuff...
And a 100 new planets...
And us...

Consider these products from Teachers Source. That link should bring you directly to their magnetics page. There's lots of cool things on this page... but scroll down to the 4th item which is a Diamagnetic Levitation Demo. Now that's cool! Other things on that page are also cool, like the Eddy Current tubes.

Or check out their UV DETECTING PRODUCTS page. Those multi-colored UV detecting beads are pretty neat!.

The site is chock full of things that are unusual, conversational, and just play cool.

Note that the site is a FRAMES site and the links above take you right to the frame. The site home page is here.

Aloha

Consider these products from Teachers Source. That link should bring you directly to their magnetics page. There's lots of cool things on this page... but scroll down to the 4th item which is a Diamagnetic Levitation Demo. Now that's cool! Other things on that page are also cool, like the Eddy Current tubes.

Or check out their UV DETECTING PRODUCTS page. Those multi-colored UV detecting beads are pretty neat!.

The site is chock full of things that are unusual, conversational, and just play cool.

Note that the site is a FRAMES site and the links above take you right to the frame. The site home page is here.

Aloha

Consider these products from Teachers Source. That link should bring you directly to their magnetics page. There's lots of cool things on this page... but scroll down to the 4th item which is a Diamagnetic Levitation Demo. Now that's cool! Other things on that page are also cool, like the Eddy Current tubes.

Or check out their UV DETECTING PRODUCTS page. Those multi-colored UV detecting beads are pretty neat!.

The site is chock full of things that are unusual, conversational, and just play cool.

Note that the site is a FRAMES site and the links above take you right to the frame. The site home page is here.

Aloha

A few friends and I bought a large bottle of the stuff, it's pretty neat to play with along with some magnets, but you need some SERIOUS power to get any real decent results, initially we were messing around with some discarded large speaker magnets and voice coils (fixed magnetic power). We went so far as to have ordered some higher power electromagnets and some extra hardware to control their strength. Unfortunately due to the recent events in our neighborhood (NYC) we haven't had a chance to experiment much more lately.

Oh and its more like liquid than goo, so dont get your hopes of creating a giant black goo monster up too high.

Anyway, if you want to pick some up for yourself try these places:

Edmund Scientific
(also has magnets, electromagnets)

Teacher Source
(this is where we got our large 1000ml bottle)

and more listed at the official ferroftec web site:
ferrofluidics

-nA