Match
Stick Puzzle One: You are an office supervisor and the matchsticks show the
movable office walls. One of your workers gets a promotion so you need to rearrange
the walls so that each person has a square office.
NB You must use all of
the matches.
Match
Stick Puzzle Two:
Using ten matches make two squares.
Match
Stick Puzzle Three:
Remove
only three matches and leave three triangles.
Tips
and Tricks:
- Draw the original puzzle positions on the board so the
students can go back to the first position.
- When handing out the matches,
give out one box between 4 students and have them distribute the matches to their
friends.
- Admit to your class that you don't know the answers to these problems
then sit and solve the puzzles with the students.
- Demonstrate being a lifelong
learner by doing the puzzles with the students and perhaps put off the onset of
dementia for a few more years :)
- Set some homework that requires the children
to find more examples of match stick problems.
The
Solutions:
- You will gain so much more by perservering at these puzzles
until you get the solution.
- The 'A-ha' feeling is so much sweeter if you
solve the problem yourself.
- The solutions are just a click away, it would
be sooooooo easy just to give up but resist the temptation!
- The puzzle
solutions are but a click away... I'm sure you have more strength than
that. Don't click!
