100 Brain Teasers to Use with Your Students

I stopped publishing these at 100, but there is a nice collection for you to use with your class! 

Be sure to check out the main page to find tons of teaching tips and ideas.

Daily Brain Teaser #100

There are 100 dogs at the dog show.
Two fifths of the dogs are Black Labs.
One fourth of the dogs are Poodles.
One fifth of the number of Poodles are Beagles.
Half the number of Black Labs are Golden Retrievers.
The rest of the dogs are Terriers.

How many of each dog are there?

Black Labs ____
Poodles _____
Beagles ______
Golden Retrievers  ______
Terriers _____

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #99

Zack, Paula, Sid, and Lynette each play a different sport. The sports are soccer, tennis, basketball, and golf. Use the clues to find out which sport each person plays.

Zack and Lynette each play their sports on a court.
Sid and Lynette both play their sport. on teams.
Paula's sport uses the smallest ball.

Zack______________
Paula______________
Sid_______________
Lynette____________

ANSWER

Trivia for the grown ups: Who are Zack, Paula, Sid, and Lynette?

Daily Brain Teaser #98

Maria's father made 80 cookies.
Maria put them all in one long line across the counter. In the line of cookies, every third cookie has chocolate chips. Every fourth cookie has raisins. Every eigth cookie has nuts.
Maria's father would like to eat cookies with all three: chocolate chips, raisins and nuts. How many cookies have all three?


____ cookies


Bonus: Which cookies, by number, will Maria's dad eat? ____________________

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #97

A small box of  pencils contains 8 pencils.

A large box of pencils contains 12 pencils.

Carla needs 48 pencils.

She buys some of each sized box.

How many of each box did she buy?

_____ small boxes
_____ large boxes

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #96

Jason bought a new skateboard and a new helmet. The skateboard cost 3 times as much as the helmet. Jason spent $96 altogether.

How much did he pay for each thing?

Helmet_______________
Skateboard: ___________
 

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #95

Use the clues to change one letter in each word to make a new word. If you do it correctly, the first word will the same as the last word.

LAKE

________ not on time
________ despise
________ head coverings
________ punches
________ small pieces
________ do with your teeth
________ ride this
________ in the oven
________ body of water

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #94

Lucy and Ricky walk to school together every day. They also walk home together.

Each day, they meet at the corner of Oak street and Maple Avenue. This is also where they part on the way home from school.

Lucy lives 2 blocks from the corner.

Ricky lives 3 blocks from the corner.

Their school is 6 blocks from the corner.

How many blocks will each child walk in 1 week of school days?

Lucy__________
Ricky_________

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #93

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #92

Lily goes swimming every Tuesday and Saturday.
Marshall goes swimming every third day.
Today is Tuesday, March 2nd and both kids have gone swimming.


On what date will they both go swimming again?


___________________

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #91

Mr. Jenkin's class sold popcorn at the school carnival.

A small bag of popcorn costs $1.50
A large bag of popcorn costs $2.50

At the end of the day, Mr. Jenkin's class had sold 26 bags of popcorn and made $45.75.

How many of each size popcorn did they sell?

Small ________
Large________

ANSWER

Picture Credit: Webweaver's Free ClipArt

Daily Brain Teaser #90

Jack and Ben were walking along a road when they saw a sign that said Joytown 126 miles, Sad City 84 miles. The towns were in opposite directions. The boys decided to walk toward Joytown. They stopped to have lunch exactly halfway between Joytown and Sad City. How far away from Sad City were they when they had lunch?

____ miles

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #89

Ms. Kendall's class had an ice cream party.

24 chldren had hot fudge on their sundaes

17 children had a cherry.

There were 26 children in the class.

How many children had both hot fudge and a cherry?

____childen

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #88

Cassie has 3 pairs of dice. What are the total number of sides, corners, and dots on her dice?

Sides _____
Corners _____
Dots ______

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #87

What word connects the three words in each group?

Example: aid ~ head ~ rock = band  (bandaid, headband, rock band)

1. mate ~ class ~ bath ______________
2. chocolate ~ maid ~ carton ______________
3. sea ~ egg ~ turtle ______________
4. swing ~ spare ~ track ______________
5. bell ~ mat ~ knob ______________
6. sweat ~ tail ~ polo ______________
7. house ~ fire ~ flash ______________
8. bed ~ computer ~ bite ______________

ANSWER

These are called Tribonds and you can find more here

Daily Brain Teaser #86

There were fifteen cookies in the cookie jar. After each of five children took cookies, there were none left. Use the clues to discover how many cookies each child took.


Diane took two cookies less than Carla

Sam took four cookies

Norm and Carla took the same number of cookies

Cliff took one more cookie than Norm

Carla took one less cookie than Sam


Cliff ____
Carla____
Norm ____
Diane ____
Sam____

ANSWER

Trivia Bonus: Who are Cliff, Carla, Norm, Diane, and Sam?

Daily Brain Teaser #85

Six girls, Amber, Anna, Beth, Gigi, Janine, and Mary wanted to do something fun on Saturday. They could not agree on one activity, so they went in pairs to 3 different activities, rollerskating, the movies, and bowling. Use the clues to discover which girls did each activity:

Gigi and Janine do not like bowling.

Mary and Beth did the same activity. Both girls had to change their footwear before doing their activity.

The two girls with names that begin with the same letter did not do the same activity. Neither of them went bowling.

Janine and Amber went to the same activity.

Gigi did not go to the movies.

Bowling   ___________ and ______________
Skating  ____________ and ______________
Movies  ____________ and ______________

Hint: Start by pairing the girls, then find their activities.

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #84

Kendra has made a list of all her favorite things, but it is missing the consonants. Can you fill them in?



KENDRA'S FAVORITES:

1. Color:  ___ ___ E E ____
2. Fruit: ___ A ___ A ___ A
3. Vegetable: ___ A ___ ___ O ___
4. Dessert:  ___ ___ O ___ ___ I E
5. Animal: ___ U ___ ___ ___ E
6. Flower:  ___ O ___ E
7. Sport:  ___ E ___ ___ I ___
8. Board Game: ___ O ___ O ___ O ___ ___
9. School Subject: ___ ___ I E ___ ___ E
10. Place: ___ I ___ ___E ___ ___A ___ ___

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #83

Put + and - signs between each number to make the equation work.

8   4   2   3   3   1 = 7

Challenge: Can you do it in two different ways?

ANSWER

Daily Brain Teaser #82

If you wrote all of the whole numbers from 1 to 100, how many times would you write the number 2?

____times

ANSWER