Filter by: Content type: ALL Problems Articles Games Stage: All Stage 1&2 Stage 2&3 Stage 3&4 Stage 4&5 Challenge level:
Only one side of a two-slice toaster is working. What is the quickest way to toast both sides of three slices of bread?
If these elves wear a different outfit every day for as many days as possible, how many days can their fun last?
An investigation that gives you the opportunity to make and justify predictions.
Make a pair of cubes that can be moved to show all the days of the month from the 1st to the 31st.
Bellringers have a special way to write down the patterns they ring. Learn about these patterns and draw some of your own.
Seven friends went to a fun fair with lots of scary rides. They decided to pair up for rides until each friend had ridden once with each of the others. What was the total number rides?
Do you notice anything about the solutions when you add and/or subtract consecutive negative numbers?
How many ways can you find to do up all four buttons on my coat? How about if I had five buttons? Six ...?
Let's suppose that you are going to have a magazine which has 16 pages of A5 size. Can you find some different ways to make these pages? Investigate the pattern for each if you number the pages.
Five numbers added together in pairs produce: 0, 2, 4, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13, 15 What are the five numbers?
Use the clues to work out which cities Mohamed, Sheng, Tanya and Bharat live in.
In the multiplication sum, some of the digits have been replaced by letters and others by asterisks. Can you reconstruct the original multiplication?
Using all ten cards from 0 to 9, rearrange them to make five prime numbers. Can you find any other ways of doing it?
Find the values of the nine letters in the sum: FOOT + BALL = GAME
The letters in the following addition sum represent the digits 1 ... 9. If A=3 and D=2, what number is represented by "CAYLEY"?
Can you replace the letters with numbers? Is there only one solution in each case?
You have been given nine weights, one of which is slightly heavier than the rest. Can you work out which weight is heavier in just two weighings of the balance?
The idea of this game is to add or subtract the two numbers on the dice and cover the result on the grid, trying to get a line of three. Are there some numbers that are good to aim for?
This multiplication uses each of the digits 0 - 9 once and once only. Using the information given, can you replace the stars in the calculation with figures?
What do the digits in the number fifteen add up to? How many other numbers have digits with the same total but no zeros?
Can you make square numbers by adding two prime numbers together?
Mr McGregor has a magic potting shed. Overnight, the number of plants in it doubles. He'd like to put the same number of plants in each of three gardens, planting one garden each day. Can he do it?
Look carefully at the numbers. What do you notice? Can you make another square using the numbers 1 to 16, that displays the same properties?
Tom and Ben visited Numberland. Use the maps to work out the number of points each of their routes scores.
Play the divisibility game to create numbers in which the first two digits make a number divisible by 2, the first three digits make a number divisible by 3...
This challenge is to design different step arrangements, which must go along a distance of 6 on the steps and must end up at 6 high.
Suppose we allow ourselves to use three numbers less than 10 and multiply them together. How many different products can you find? How do you know you've got them all?
Add the sum of the squares of four numbers between 10 and 20 to the sum of the squares of three numbers less than 6 to make the square of another, larger, number.
You cannot choose a selection of ice cream flavours that includes totally what someone has already chosen. Have a go and find all the different ways in which seven children can have ice cream.
Investigate the different ways you could split up these rooms so that you have double the number.
Can you arrange the numbers 1 to 17 in a row so that each adjacent pair adds up to a square number?
How could you put eight beanbags in the hoops so that there are four in the blue hoop, five in the red and six in the yellow? Can you find all the ways of doing this?
Stuart's watch loses two minutes every hour. Adam's watch gains one minute every hour. Use the information to work out what time (the real time) they arrived at the airport.
In this challenge, buckets come in five different sizes. If you choose some buckets, can you investigate the different ways in which they can be filled?
Choose four different digits from 1-9 and put one in each box so that the resulting four two-digit numbers add to a total of 100.
A mathematician goes into a supermarket and buys four items. Using a calculator she multiplies the cost instead of adding them. How can her answer be the same as the total at the till?
Place the numbers 1 to 8 in the circles so that no consecutive numbers are joined by a line.
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?
Nina must cook some pasta for 15 minutes but she only has a 7-minute sand-timer and an 11-minute sand-timer. How can she use these timers to measure exactly 15 minutes?
Place eight queens on an chessboard (an 8 by 8 grid) so that none can capture any of the others.
A merchant brings four bars of gold to a jeweller. How can the jeweller use the scales just twice to identify the lighter, fake bar?
There are 4 jugs which hold 9 litres, 7 litres, 4 litres and 2 litres. Find a way to pour 9 litres of drink from one jug to another until you are left with exactly 3 litres in three of the jugs.
Find a cuboid (with edges of integer values) that has a surface area of exactly 100 square units. Is there more than one? Can you find them all?
In the planet system of Octa the planets are arranged in the shape of an octahedron. How many different routes could be taken to get from Planet A to Planet Zargon?
What do you notice about the date 03.06.09? Or 08.01.09? This challenge invites you to investigate some interesting dates yourself.
An investigation involving adding and subtracting sets of consecutive numbers. Lots to find out, lots to explore.
Ten cards are put into five envelopes so that there are two cards in each envelope. The sum of the numbers inside it is written on each envelope. What numbers could be inside the envelopes?
Each clue number in this sudoku is the product of the two numbers in adjacent cells.
There are 78 prisoners in a square cell block of twelve cells. The clever prison warder arranged them so there were 25 along each wall of the prison block. How did he do it?
This problem is based on the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin. Investigate the different numbers of people and rats there could have been if you know how many legs there are altogether!