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As soon as I saw this twenty cubes puzzle, I knew it was the perfect puzzle to use in my classroom with linking cubes. The Twenty Cubes Puzzle asks students to arrange twenty cubes in four piles using five given clues:
- All piles contain an even number of cubes.
- There are twice as many cubes in the first pile as in the second pile.
- The largest number of cubes is in the first pile.
- All piles have a different number of cubes.
- Each pile has at least one cube.
Linking cubes are one of my favorite math manipulatives; there are so many different ways to use them in the classroom. If you don’t have a class set of linking cubes (or snap cubes), you are missing out on awesome activities like Speedy Squares or Fawn Nguyen’s Hotel Snap! I also recommend checking out Build It, a great team building activity for the first week of school that uses linking cubes.
I discovered this Twenty Cubes puzzle while looking through Brain Bafflers by Robert Steinwachs (Sterling Publishing).
Free Download of Twenty Cubes Puzzle
Twenty Cubes Puzzle (PDF) (5324 downloads )
Twenty Cubes Puzzle (Editable Publisher File ZIP) (1175 downloads )
Want more puzzles? Check out my puzzles 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.
Jackie
Wednesday 13th of October 2021
Love your puzzles and am starting to incorporate them into my math class! This one seemed like a quick solution and I am wondering if I am missing something?
Sarah Carter
Wednesday 20th of October 2021
This one is a much quicker puzzle to solve than many of the ones I have posted. So glad to hear that you are using puzzles with your students!