It’s always great when a really challenging activity requires absolutely NO PREP!
Most of my gifted elementary students loved logic puzzles and problems of all kinds. In our classroom, we had a logic center I created by pulling the pages out of PERPLEXORS workbooks, putting them in sheet protectors, and then filing them in labeled cubbies. I purchased a literature sorter at a discount which made a perfect center (see photo). The students used dry erase markers to solve the puzzles and checked their own answers (answer keys were laminated and also filed in a cubby). My students knew that if they were in transition from one project to another, they could get a logic problem at any time. They kept track of which ones they’d completed on a tracking sheet I created.
| If your students are new to this type of puzzle, I have created a video tutorial showing how to solve a more advanced puzzle. The puzzle in the video is available (free) here and ready to share with students as a lesson in puzzle solving. |
One year, I began challenging students to create their own logic problems, and it became an ongoing activity in my grades 3 -5 pullout classes. I gave them very little direction at first. Later, though, I created this to give students some direction. We created a special cubby in our logic center for student-created puzzles. In order to be added to the center, the puzzle had to be tested and successfully solved by at least two classmates.
We also published many of these on our class blog (sadly, no longer alive online) and made poster-sized logic puzzles to display in our school’s maker space. They were laminated and visitors could solve them with dry-erase markers. We then submitted original kid-created puzzles to Creative Kids magazine, a publication no longer in print. We were thrilled when they began adding original student puzzles and games to their magazines. It was thrilling for my students to be “published.”
| UPDATE! Your students can submit their kid-created puzzles to Solving Fun. They can even sign up to be “puzzle testers” in their Puzzle Lab! Learn more about this new community! |
Some students were reluctant to try or did not want to persevere in the challenge, but when encouraged to keep at it, almost all were rewarded by the satisfaction of creating a solvable puzzle. As with many projects, if kids feel their work will have value to others and be used or displayed, they will often work harder to produce a quality product. Best of all for the teacher, though, is that it can be an ongoing challenge throughout the year and only requires paper and pencil!
If you try this, leave a comment and let us know how it went. Better yet, please consider joining our Facebook group where you can share and connect with other teachers whose students are doing the same thing. It would be fun for your students to solve puzzles other students created and share their original puzzles!
To learn more about the resources on this site, please watch this 5-minute video tour. You can receive updates about new resources added to the lists on the site and new lesson ideas when you subscribe. Emails are sent out once or twice a month.
STRUCTURES, SYSTEMS, MYSTERIES, IMPACT