Filter by: Content type: ALL Problems Articles Games Stage: All Stage 1&2 Stage 2&3 Stage 3&4 Stage 4&5 Challenge level:
In this town, houses are built with one room for each person. There are some families of seven people living in the town. In how many different ways can they build their houses?
Here you see the front and back views of a dodecahedron. Each vertex has been numbered so that the numbers around each pentagonal face add up to 65. Can you find all the missing numbers?
Swap the stars with the moons, using only knights' moves (as on a chess board). What is the smallest number of moves possible?
10 space travellers are waiting to board their spaceships. There are two rows of seats in the waiting room. Using the rules, where are they all sitting? Can you find all the possible ways?
Can you find ways of joining cubes together so that 28 faces are visible?
A dog is looking for a good place to bury his bone. Can you work out where he started and ended in each case? What possible routes could he have taken?
What is the best way to shunt these carriages so that each train can continue its journey?
Hover your mouse over the counters to see which ones will be removed. Click to remover them. The winner is the last one to remove a counter. How you can make sure you win?
You have 4 red and 5 blue counters. How many ways can they be placed on a 3 by 3 grid so that all the rows columns and diagonals have an even number of red counters?
Building up a simple Celtic knot. Try the interactivity or download the cards or have a go on squared paper.
Can you shunt the trucks so that the Cattle truck and the Sheep truck change places and the Engine is back on the main line?
How many different ways can you find of fitting five hexagons together? How will you know you have found all the ways?
Find your way through the grid starting at 2 and following these operations. What number do you end on?
How many different cuboids can you make when you use four CDs or DVDs? How about using five, then six?
A magician took a suit of thirteen cards and held them in his hand face down. Every card he revealed had the same value as the one he had just finished spelling. How did this work?
In how many ways can you fit two of these yellow triangles together? Can you predict the number of ways two blue triangles can be fitted together?
If you split the square into these two pieces, it is possible to fit the pieces together again to make a new shape. How many new shapes can you make?
How many DIFFERENT quadrilaterals can be made by joining the dots on the 8-point circle?
Take a rectangle of paper and fold it in half, and half again, to make four smaller rectangles. How many different ways can you fold it up?
A tetromino is made up of four squares joined edge to edge. Can this tetromino, together with 15 copies of itself, be used to cover an eight by eight chessboard?
What happens when you try and fit the triomino pieces into these two grids?
Can you cover the camel with these pieces?
How many different triangles can you make on a circular pegboard that has nine pegs?
This 100 square jigsaw is written in code. It starts with 1 and ends with 100. Can you build it up?
Make one big triangle so the numbers that touch on the small triangles add to 10. You could use the interactivity to help you.
What is the greatest number of counters you can place on the grid below without four of them lying at the corners of a square?
What is the least number of moves you can take to rearrange the bears so that no bear is next to a bear of the same colour?
How can you arrange the 5 cubes so that you need the smallest number of Brush Loads of paint to cover them? Try with other numbers of cubes as well.
What is the smallest cuboid that you can put in this box so that you cannot fit another that's the same into it?
Cut four triangles from a square as shown in the picture. How many different shapes can you make by fitting the four triangles back together?
Can you make a 3x3 cube with these shapes made from small cubes?
One face of a regular tetrahedron is painted blue and each of the remaining faces are painted using one of the colours red, green or yellow. How many different possibilities are there?
In a square in which the houses are evenly spaced, numbers 3 and 10 are opposite each other. What is the smallest and what is the largest possible number of houses in the square?
What happens to the area of a square if you double the length of the sides? Try the same thing with rectangles, diamonds and other shapes. How do the four smaller ones fit into the larger one?
This challenge involves eight three-cube models made from interlocking cubes. Investigate different ways of putting the models together then compare your constructions.
A toy has a regular tetrahedron, a cube and a base with triangular and square hollows. If you fit a shape into the correct hollow a bell rings. How many times does the bell ring in a complete game?
Use the three triangles to fill these outline shapes. Perhaps you can create some of your own shapes for a friend to fill?
Investigate the number of paths you can take from one vertex to another in these 3D shapes. Is it possible to take an odd number and an even number of paths to the same vertex?
How can you arrange these 10 matches in four piles so that when you move one match from three of the piles into the fourth, you end up with the same arrangement?
This problem invites you to build 3D shapes using two different triangles. Can you make the shapes from the pictures?
Imagine a 3 by 3 by 3 cube. If you and a friend drill holes in some of the small cubes in the ways described, how many will have holes drilled through them?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of Little Ming?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of Granma T?
Make a cube out of straws and have a go at this practical challenge.
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of the chairs?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of these clocks?
We start with one yellow cube and build around it to make a 3x3x3 cube with red cubes. Then we build around that red cube with blue cubes and so on. How many cubes of each colour have we used?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of these people?
How many pieces of string have been used in these patterns? Can you describe how you know?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of the child walking home from school?