Trending Resource: Free Halloween Math Activities & Puzzles
Tomorrow is my first day of the school year with students! Yesterday and today were teacher days, and I do not feel fully ready and prepared for back to school this year. Even though I feel like I could use another week or so to prepare, I am excited about having students back in my…
I’m excited to get back to featuring a new puzzle of the week every week in my classroom this year. A new puzzle I have prepped for this year is called Three of Five. Three of these five figures fit together to create a triangle. Which ones are they? I ran across this puzzle in…
I’m excited about trying out this five arrows puzzle with my students when we start back to school next week! Can you rearrange the four arrows to form five arrows? As soon as I saw this puzzle in The Big Book of Brain Games by Ivan Moscovich, I knew I had to make a version…
Looking for ideas as you plan your first day of school math activities? I’ve got enough fun and interactive activities here to last you the entire first week of school and then some!
Happy Monday! I’m coming to the realization that summer is almost over. I’m helping out with vacation bible school this week, and I’ve been telling myself all summer that I have to start thinking seriously about school after VBS is over. To help get me in a back-to school mood, let’s take a look at…
I ran across this exponent rules match-up activity in the Algebra Activities Instructor’s Resource Binder from Maria Andersen. It was published by Cengage in 2011. I thought it would make the perfect review activity for exponent rules for my Algebra 2 students. I did find a copy of the activity uploaded online (page 7 of…
Several years ago, I heard about the Let’s Make Squares activity from an OKMath Newsletter sent out by Christine Koerner. She recommended Let’s Make Squares as a great activity for the first week of school. I had already decided that I was going to do the 2s to 9s Challenge as my first day of…
Recommended Websites As teachers, we are always on the lookout for websites that help make teaching easier so we can focus our efforts on helping our students learn. Here is a collection of helpful websites I have found and used in my classroom over the years. ACT Prep Materials Check out this set of 180…
Happy Monday! I have just over a month of summer left. To get me in the mood for thinking about next school year, I thought I should put together a new volume of Monday Must Reads. If you’re new around here, Monday Must Reads is my weekly-ish attempt at capturing the amazing ideas shared by…
A couple of years ago, I created this trigonometry puzzle to keep my students busy when we unexpectedly finished our lesson with more time to spare than I had planned. This trigonometry puzzle is really the Twisted Wires Puzzle by Cliff Pickover in disguise. To keep my students from googling the puzzle (as they have…
I am really intrigued by these square sudoku puzzles from Erich Friedman. Place 16 digits in each 4 x 4 array so that every row and column contains the same 4 digits in a different order. Each rectangular box should contain the digits of a perfect square when read across or down. Need help remembering…
Welcome to a tour of my 2020-2021 high school math classroom decorations! This school year, I taught Algebra 2, Pre-Calculus, and Statistics. Normally, I would post these pictures at the beginning of the school year, but we all know that this past school year got off to a very strange start due to COVID! I…
This Pyramid Puzzle challenges you to assemble the nine pieces to make a pyramid shape. No squares of the same color touch each other. Pieces may be rotated, but not overlapped or flipped. This puzzle uses the exact same game pieces as the Beehive Puzzle I shared last week. So, if you’ve already printed that…
In this Magic Square 15 Puzzle, your task is to arrange the numbers 1 through 9 in the grid so that the numbers in each row, column, and main diagonal sum to 15. I’ve typed up so many different puzzles for my classroom over the years, but somehow I’ve managed to overlook including a basic…
Shelli mentioned to me the other day that she was really enjoying reading through old Monday Must Reads posts. This was a great reminder that I haven’t done a new volume of Monday Must Reads since summer started. Monday Must Reads is my weekly-ish attempt at capturing the amazing ideas I see shared by other…
This 577 = 11111 Puzzle asks you to arrange the numbers 5, 7, and 7 to make a shape. Then, you are tasked to make an identical shape using the numbers 1, 1, 1, 1, and 1. This creative puzzle was created by Erich Friedman and shared in Puzzle Box, Volume 1. Have you noticed…
This Beehive Puzzle challenges you to assemble the nine pieces to make a beehive shape. No squares of the same color touch each other. Pieces may be rotated, but not overlapped or flipped. This puzzle is from The Big, Big, Big Book of Brainteasers. This book (one of my fave puzzle books!) is out of…
I really like this lovely radicals task from Terry Stickels. It simply asks: Which of the following is the smallest? I shared it on twitter, and I loved reading through people’s logical reasoning as they worked through the problem! I found this problem in The Big Book of Mind-Bending Puzzles by Terry Stickels.
I created these unit circle magnets to use with my dry erase magnetic unit circle from EAI Education. I plan to use the magnets both as a way to have a large unit circle on the wall of my classroom and for various activities throughout the year. When I share pictures of my magnetic unit…
The Parts of a Whole Puzzle gives students five shapes that must be arranged to form a triangle whose three sides are of equal length. In other words, form an equilateral triangle. I would have renamed this as the Equilateral Triangle Puzzle, but I have already shared a different equilateral triangle puzzle on my blog…
I can’t believe it’s my last Monday of the 2020-2021 school year. I am SO ready for summer (and to start thinking about next school year!) Here’s my latest volume of Monday Must Reads where I share some of the great ideas I have ran across on twitter with you lovely readers. Enjoy! Investigator Newsletters…
I’m super excited about using this ink stain matching activity as a first day of school activity for next year. It’s a great conversation starter, and I can see it being used in many different types of classrooms and subjects as a beginning of year team-building activity. If you are still in school and looking…
Similar to the Pyramid Solitaire Puzzle I blogged about a few weeks ago, I found this Cross Solitaire Puzzle in The Diagram Group’s Little Giant Encyclopedia of Puzzles. The goal is to pace the 32 markers in a cross pattern with the middle square unoccupied. Then, jump the markers horizontally and vertically so that a…
I’m really excited about this Pentasquares puzzle from Serhiy Grabarchuk. Pentasquares are five square shapes which fit inside a 3 x 3 dimension. The goal of this puzzle is to put all six pentasquares inside a 6 x 6 square. You can rotate the pentasquares, but you may not overlap them or flip them over….
I ran across this X Marks the Spot Puzzle several years ago. The goal of the puzzle is to place Xs in the drawing so that a certain set of requirements is met. After typing up this puzzle with several other brainteasers, I promptly misplaced the computer file before ever using any of the puzzles…
I ran across this Pyramid Solitaire Puzzle in The Diagram Group’s Little Giant Encyclopedia of Puzzles. The goal is to pace the 16 markers in a pyramid pattern. Then, jump the markers horizontally and vertically so that a single marker remains in the center of the board. Each jump moves a marker over any adjacent…
This week, my students have been taking turns tackling this tricky H Puzzle. The goal of the puzzle is to arrange the six given pieces to form a symmetric letter H. The pieces may not overlap one another in the final configuration. If you like puzzles like this, I have previously shared the T Puzzle…