Make Six Puzzle – Number Challenge

The Make Six Challenge is actually eight fun math challenges in one that all involve using three of the same digits to make the number 6.

This puzzle is just one of many free printable number challenges that I have created for my own classroom and am sharing with you!

Be sure to check out my entire collection of free printable math puzzles.

Looking for more first day of school activities and puzzles for your classroom? I have a giant blog post dedicated to 40+ activities for the first week of school.

Here’s a few examples of some of these engaging activities for the beginning of the school year.

• 
  Pencil Area Division Logic Puzzles
• 
  Math Latin Square Puzzles
• 
  Welcome to 7th Grade Pentominoes Activity
• 
  First Day of School Activities, Puzzles, & Games
• 
  First Day of School Hidden Word Puzzle
• 
  Back to School Word Search Puzzle

Challenge Instructions

In this Make Six Puzzle, you are given eight equations. You must insert mathematical symbols (no digits) to make each equation equal six. If you are wondering what mathematical symbols you are allowed to use, that is up to you!

The only restriction is that you cannot add any digits to the equation. This includes adding exponents.

Puzzle Source

I first featured the puzzle in Volume 66 of Monday Must Reads. Tierney Kennedy shared this puzzle after seeing it on LinkedIn of all places.

In the comments of that twitter thread, 1to9puzzle [SPOILER ALERT – this link includes discussion of solutions] shared that they had run across the puzzle three years previously and had shared it on their twitter account.

As a result, I’m not sure exactly who to credit with the puzzle. If anyone knows of a source, I would love for you to share so I can share more details with my readers!

Even though I don’t know the exact origin of this Make Six Puzzle/Number Challenge, but I knew as soon as I saw it that I had to turn it into a resource I could use in my high school math classroom.

Using this Puzzle in the Classroom

I created a printable version of this make six puzzle to make it easy for teachers to use this puzzle with students in the classroom.

I printed the puzzle out on regular copy paper and gave it to students as worksheet to complete in groups, but you could also print it and slide it into a dry erase pocket to make a dry erase activity.