Math Triples Puzzle

How well do you know your math vocabulary? This Math Triples Puzzle will test your ability to piece together various three letter word fragments to create mathematical terms.

Puzzle Instructions

Combine the letter trios to spell out some words associated with mathematics. Each trio of letters will be used exactly once.

Puzzle Inspiration

This puzzle was inspired by a “Holiday Triples” puzzle published by Erich Friedman in 2013 as part of a holiday puzzles collection. Instead of featuring holiday-themed words, I decided to take the puzzle structure and modify it to feature math words. After all, math does equal love…

I have also created a Halloween version of this word puzzle I am calling “Halloween Triples” or “Spooky Triples” and a Thanksgiving version called “Thanksgiving Triples Puzzle.”

Prepping the Puzzle

I printed the letter trios on cardstock and ran the cardstock through my laminator before cutting the pieces apart.

Laminating the pieces is completely optional if you print the puzzle pieces on cardstock. I would definitely take the time to laminate, however, if you just print on regular colored copy paper.

Fun fact: Shaun and I have been married 7 years now, and I am still printing puzzles on the purple and teal cardstock that we bought in bulk to make the programs for our wedding.

I decided to add ceramic disc magnets to the back of my puzzle pieces so that I could hang the puzzle on my dry erase board as our puzzle of the week. But, this is totally optional.

I actually ran out of magnets, so I had students who worked on one version of the puzzle on their desk while I was waiting on Amazon to deliver my new box of magnets.

If I wasn’t doing a weekly magnetic puzzle, I would just make several sets of these cards and store them in ziplock bags for students to take to their desk to solve.

Two Puzzle Versions

I created two different versions of this puzzle with varying levels of mathematical difficulty.

Set 1

The first set (printed on teal cardstock) features almost entirely math vocabulary words which are appropriate for upper elementary school, middle school, and high school with the exception of one word which might be a bit tricky.

Set 1 does include the word “congruent.” If you are working with younger students who you think might be thrown off with this word, you could just remove the three letter cards which spell congruent before giving the puzzle to students.

Set 2

Set 2 includes many mathematical terms that students likely won’t be familiar with until Algebra 2.

I currently teach Statistics, Precalculus, and AP Calculus, so I wanted to create include a few trickier math terms for my students.

Examples of words included in set 2 include “Matrix” and “Logarithm.”