Brain Teasers!: Over 180 Quick Activities & Worksheets That Make Kids THINK (Paperback)

by Susan S. Petreshene (Author) "When brainstorming classification topics, it is fun to structure the activity so that children must stretch their minds beyond the common, more obvious categories..." (more)
Key Phrases: activity eraser, total group activity chalk, reproducible activity page, Partner Activities, Oral Directions, Player One (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
Nearly 200 "quickie" classroom activities and reproducible worksheets to develop the thinking, reasoning and memory skills of elementary students and help them master both basic and advanced concepts in math, language and writing. Ideal ways to get kids involved, vary instruction, fill spare minutes, introduce or reinforce specific skills/concepts, and assign as homework.

From the Back Cover
For all K-6 teachers, here are nearly 200 exciting "quickie" classroom activities and reproducible worksheets to develop the thinking, reasoning, and memory skills of your elementary students and help them master both basic and advanced concepts in math, language, and writing.

Each activity or reproducible takes just 5 to 15 minutes and requires no prior preparation— all you need are simple materials such as paper and pencil or chalk and chalkboard. Simply open this valuable resource to find an appropriate activity in one of these four major skills and subject areas:

Thinking and reasoning
Students develop their thinking and problem-solving skills with 48 activities and worksheets that ask them to classify and categorize objects, make decisions for story characters faced with a dilemma, place events in logical sequence, create flowcharts, and find hidden analogies between words.

Math
Here you get 73 activities and worksheets such as "Magic 4," a mischievous math trick that gives students practice in addition, subtraction, and division. Other activities use games, memory challenges, and logic problems to teach such important concepts as estimation, decimals, computation, relationships and patterns, place value, odd/even coordinates and graphs, money, and geometry.

Language and writing
65 enjoyable word games, listening exercises, puzzles, add-on stories, and anagrams give students valuable practice in phonics, spelling, vocabulary, rhymes, compound words, and different parts of speech. For example, "Synonyms with Style" helps students stretch their vocabulary as they replace commonly used words with "stylish" synonyms.

Listening and remembering
Here you'll find 7 classroom activities that use body movement, mazes, and repetition to help students develop skills in critical listening, following oral directions, and memory. For example, "Can You Add to My Sentence?" involves students in creative thinking and memorization as they take turns adding words onto a phrase (after repeating everything that came before) until it becomes a long story.

Better still, you'll find the 82 full-page worksheets can be copied at a moment's notice for instant handout assignments. And to help you quickly select appropriate activities and worksheets for individual and group needs, a special Activity/Skills Index lists all of the activities and reproducibles by subject matter, group size, and grade level.

With Brain Teasers! Spare minutes become prime learning time. You'll turn to it every day to stimulate, reinforce, and expand the thinking skills of all your students!

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Product Details

• Paperback: 265 pages
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass (June 15, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0876281234
• ISBN-13: 978-0876281239
• Product Dimensions: 10.8 x 8.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #265,736 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars GREAT extra work, March 24, 2000

By	Barbara Gonzales (usa) - See all my reviews

I copied different pages with 9th graders, and they REALLY enjoyed doing the problems. They did this after a test or when they had finished their assignment. I am a substitute teacher and this is a GREAT fill in when all the work is finished. May be used in other grades also.

4.0 out of 5 stars Good resource for parents, too, April 23, 2007

By	S. Cuthbertson - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

My son has really responded to the activities in this book. We've used activities from the "Thinking and Reasoning" and "Listening and Remembering" sections as warm-ups for more challenging work, and the math and language activities look like they'd be good "bridge" activities for the summer months. Although this book is intended for use in the classroom and contains some partner activities, it appears that most of the group activities can be used with a single child. And, of course, you can always be your child's partner for the partner activities.

5.0 out of 5 stars a must have, January 15, 2007

By	B. Russell (i'd rather not say) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I've looked at various teaching resources that claim to make kids think and several of them actually do. This one was impressive to me because of the diversity of the activities- it has math, language and general reasoning. It would be appropriate for children as young as first grade. (But perfectly suitable for my 4th graders.) I would recommend this book to any teacher for extension activities.