This blog post contains Amazon affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases. This comes at no cost to you. Thanks for your support of Math = Love!
To give my students some practice on combining like terms, I assigned them to work through a combining like terms maze in their groups. I found this maze online here (page 12 of the PDF)! It looks like it’s from some sort of enrichment workbook or resource, but I’m not sure where it is from exactly. If you recognize this and know the source, please let me know so I can share it with others!

The PDF of the combining like terms maze was a bit messy looking, so I did some cutting and pasting to pretty it up.

I printed a class set and slid them into one of my favorite tools – dry erase pockets!
MATH = LOVE RECOMMENDS…

I cannot imagine teaching math without my dry erase pockets! They instantly make any activity more engaging and save me countless hours at the copy machine since I can use the same class sets of copies year after year.
Here are my current go-to recommendations:
If you don’t have a classroom set of dry erase pockets, you could also use heavy duty sheet protectors. But, I highly recommend investing in a classroom set of the pockets since they are so much more durable.

After passing these out to my class, I instructed them to read the instructions before starting. They obviously didn’t listen to me because I was soon being asked “Do we start from the top or the bottom?” Ugh. I’m five years into this teaching thing, and I still don’t know how to get my students to read the instructions.

I thought this combining like maze would be a BREEZE for my students to complete, but they found it really tricky. In retrospect, we should have done a lot more practice problems on our dry erase boards BEFORE I gave them this maze! What I do love about this maze is that all of the problems are made to look like they could possibly simplify to 3m^2 + n. So, students really have to think critically!

Free Download of Combining Like Terms Maze
Combining Like Terms Maze (PDF) (2857 downloads)
Combining Like Terms Maze (Editable Publisher File ZIP) (919 downloads)
I also recommend checking out my cut and paste activity for introducing combining like terms!
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.
Dotti Morrison
Tuesday 28th of February 2023
I absolutely LOVE your items
Francisco Francisco De Los Santos Vasquz
Friday 27th of August 2021
where is the answer key?
Sarah Carter
Saturday 28th of August 2021
Sending an email!
Anonymous
Tuesday 20th of August 2019
Hi!, I think that it's great that you want to do this, but what about the answer key?
Unknown
Monday 19th of September 2016
I LOVE tantrix... I had a set at my old school... I had to leave it behind.
Question on Challenge one with the orange shapes, it says make a square with exactly one shape. Should that be some other number??? Thanks!
Unknown
Monday 19th of September 2016
Once again, thank you Sarah for sharing your work with all of us.