A Plus Puzzle
Engage students with the A Plus Puzzle! Free printable math activity where they assemble 5 pieces to form a plus sign. Fun and interactive for all!
Mondays are quickly becoming a day that my students look forward to. Yesterday, I overheard one student excitedly tell another that they were excited to see what this week’s joke was. Then, they raced to read it and check out the answer.
![Math Joke of the Week](https://mathequalslove.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/math-joke-of-week-001.jpg)
Ready for it? According to another one of my students, this week’s joke is a good one!
Want more math jokes? Check out my math joke of the week collection.
Monday is also the day of the week when I switch out our weekly magnetic puzzle.
Last week, we tackled the Nine Squares Puzzle that I posted this summer.
This week we’re testing out a brand-new puzzle called the A Plus Puzzle from The World’s Biggest Book of Brainteasers & Logic Puzzles. This book is massive at around 700 pages, but I was a bit disappointed in the fact that it had very few puzzles of the sort that I like to use in my classroom with moving pieces.
The A plus puzzle gives you five shapes which must be arranged into a plus sign. Yes, it is possible.
No, this does not count as a plus sign.
Yes, this will drive both students and teachers crazy. I included this in a presentation I did this summer, and I had some teachers rather frustrated with this puzzle for quite some time. The look on their faces when they finally figured it out was priceless.
Free Download of A Plus Puzzle
A Plus Puzzle (PDF) (1481 downloads )
A Plus Puzzle (Editable Publisher File ZIP) (774 downloads )
Want even more puzzles? Check out my dedicated puzzle page.
Puzzle Solutions
I intentionally do not make answers to the printable math puzzles I share on my blog available online because I strive to provide learning experiences for my students that are non-google-able. I would like other teachers to be able to use these puzzles in their classrooms as well without the solutions being easily found on the Internet.
However, I do recognize that us teachers are busy people and sometimes need to quickly reference an answer key to see if a student has solved a puzzle correctly or to see if they have interpreted the instructions properly.
If you are a teacher who is using these puzzles in your classroom, please send me an email at sarah@mathequalslove.net with information about what you teach and where you teach. I will be happy to forward an answer key to you.
My students want to know if the pieces can be stacked?
Can you please post a solution??!! Four adults 120 kids couldn't figure it out today! LOL . My kiddos are really wanting to know the answer to this.
Thanks!
Changing the puzzle weekly is a great engagement tool and way to keep the students looking forward to doing math which can be a difficult subject for some. Do you just browse amazon to find your resources or are there any blogs/sites you follow that recommend materials?
Can you post the solution?
Thanks
I used to do fun things like puzzles of the week. Thanks for the ideas and the reminders! It seems like I never have time to do anything extra. But I would like to implement some things for students to look forward to.
solution includes the biggest piece being diaganal