Filter by: Content type: ALL Problems Articles Games Stage: All Stage 1&2 Stage 2&3 Stage 3&4 Stage 4&5 Challenge level:
Sweets are given out to party-goers in a particular way. Investigate the total number of sweets received by people sitting in different positions.
Noah saw 12 legs walk by into the Ark. How many creatures did he see?
Exactly 195 digits have been used to number the pages in a book. How many pages does the book have?
Two children made up a game as they walked along the garden paths. Can you find out their scores? Can you find some paths of your own?
Can you follow the rule to decode the messages?
Find the sum of all three-digit numbers each of whose digits is odd.
In how many ways could Mrs Beeswax put ten coins into her three puddings so that each pudding ended up with at least two coins?
Using the cards 2, 4, 6, 8, +, - and =, what number statements can you make?
Woof is a big dog. Yap is a little dog. Emma has 16 dog biscuits to give to the two dogs. She gave Woof 4 more biscuits than Yap. How many biscuits did each dog get?
There were 22 legs creeping across the web. How many flies? How many spiders?
Vera is shopping at a market with these coins in her purse. Which things could she give exactly the right amount for?
Sam got into an elevator. He went down five floors, up six floors, down seven floors, then got out on the second floor. On what floor did he get on?
The value of the circle changes in each of the following problems. Can you discover its value in each problem?
Can you score 100 by throwing rings on this board? Is there more than way to do it?
We can arrange dots in a similar way to the 5 on a dice and they usually sit quite well into a rectangular shape. How many altogether in this 3 by 5? What happens for other sizes?
Lolla bought a balloon at the circus. She gave the clown six coins to pay for it. What could Lolla have paid for the balloon?
Using 3 rods of integer lengths, none longer than 10 units and not using any rod more than once, you can measure all the lengths in whole units from 1 to 10 units. How many ways can you do this?
There were chews for 2p, mini eggs for 3p, Chocko bars for 5p and lollypops for 7p in the sweet shop. What could each of the children buy with their money?
Can you arrange fifteen dominoes so that all the touching domino pieces add to 6 and the ends join up? Can you make all the joins add to 7?
A lady has a steel rod and a wooden pole and she knows the length of each. How can she measure out an 8 unit piece of pole?
In your bank, you have three types of coins. The number of spots shows how much they are worth. Can you choose coins to exchange with the groups given to make the same total?
Winifred Wytsh bought a box each of jelly babies, milk jelly bears, yellow jelly bees and jelly belly beans. In how many different ways could she make a jolly jelly feast with 32 legs?
What is happening at each box in these machines?
You have 5 darts and your target score is 44. How many different ways could you score 44?
Katie had a pack of 20 cards numbered from 1 to 20. She arranged the cards into 6 unequal piles where each pile added to the same total. What was the total and how could this be done?
An investigation involving adding and subtracting sets of consecutive numbers. Lots to find out, lots to explore.
The clockmaker's wife cut up his birthday cake to look like a clock face. Can you work out who received each piece?
This problem is based on a code using two different prime numbers less than 10. You'll need to multiply them together and shift the alphabet forwards by the result. Can you decipher the code?
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?
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.
Ben has five coins in his pocket. How much money might he have?
Find your way through the grid starting at 2 and following these operations. What number do you end on?
Ram divided 15 pennies among four small bags. He could then pay any sum of money from 1p to 15p without opening any bag. How many pennies did Ram put in each bag?
Arrange three 1s, three 2s and three 3s in this square so that every row, column and diagonal adds to the same total.
Find all the numbers that can be made by adding the dots on two dice.
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.
Write the numbers up to 64 in an interesting way so that the shape they make at the end is interesting, different, more exciting ... than just a square.
Find at least one way to put in some operation signs (+ - x ÷) to make these digits come to 100.
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?
On the planet Vuv there are two sorts of creatures. The Zios have 3 legs and the Zepts have 7 legs. The great planetary explorer Nico counted 52 legs. How many Zios and how many Zepts were there?
Cassandra, David and Lachlan are brothers and sisters. They range in age between 1 year and 14 years. Can you figure out their exact ages from the clues?
Tell your friends that you have a strange calculator that turns numbers backwards. What secret number do you have to enter to make 141 414 turn around?
Place the digits 1 to 9 into the circles so that each side of the triangle adds to the same total.
Where can you draw a line on a clock face so that the numbers on both sides have the same total?
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!
Place the numbers 1 to 6 in the circles so that each number is the difference between the two numbers just below it.
What do you notice about the date 03.06.09? Or 08.01.09? This challenge invites you to investigate some interesting dates yourself.
Find the next number in this pattern: 3, 7, 19, 55 ...
Can you make a train the same length as Laura's but using three differently coloured rods? Is there only one way of doing it?
Use your logical reasoning to work out how many cows and how many sheep there are in each field.