42 maths teasers for KS3/4 – A puzzle a day for the summer holidays

What’s your biggest fear over the summer holidays?

Clowns? No not clowns, don’t be ridiculous. Spiders? Absolutely not. Shark attack? This isn’t Jaws, and sharks are likely to strike while you’re on the sofa watching Game of Thrones with one eye and planning for the new school year with the other.

No, it’s worrying that students will forget absolutely everything they’ve learned over the past year. Well, that and the state of education.

But while we can’t do much about the latter, we can try to help out a little with the former.

We’ve picked out 42 maths puzzlers, one for each day of the six-week holiday (even though it’s very unlikely students will have exactly six weeks off).

Give students this link before they leave for the year, or email each question out a day at a time if you have the patience.

Just click the link on each one (on either the image or the title) to try them out in full and get the solutions.

Day 1 | 12 to 15

Day 2 | Puzzling Taxi Fares

Day 3 | 3 x 3 magic square

Day 4 | Even number

Day 5 | Money matters

Solution booklet can be found here

Day 6 | Roll the dice

Player A's score is determined by taking the highest of 3 dice.
Player B's is determined by taking second-highest of 8.
Who wins more games?

— Ben Orlin (@benorlin) June 16, 2016

Day 7 | Game on

Day 8 | Compound rectangular shapes

Day 9 | The Stupid Gardener

Day 10 | 1996 puzzle

Day 11 | Dizzy Digits

Day 12 | Medal muddle

Day 13 | iPhones and iPads

Day 14 | Insert 1-15

DAY 163 | https://t.co/gPLkNjN0jc

Insert the numbers 1-15, once each, into the gaps below:

◯+◯=◯
◯+◯=◯
◯+◯=◯
◯+◯=◯
◯+◯=◯#MATHELONA pic.twitter.com/lMVsmsFlzK

— Paul Godding (@7puzzle) June 11, 2017

Day 15 | Save the date

Solution booklet can be found here

Day 16 | Bavarian

Day 17 | The Puzzled Farmer

Day 18 | Header

Day 19 | Five card trick

Day 20 | Tricky Twenty Triangle

Day 21 | Working with ratios

Day 22 | Eye colours

Day 23 | Bridge over troubled students

Day 24 | Three spinners

Day 25 | Pipes and Pathways

Day 26 | Monk steps

Day 27 | Circles

Day 28 | Head over Tails

Day 29 | 15 to 1

Solution booklet can be found here

Day 30 | Going to St Ives

Day 31 | Alison’s quilt

Day 32 | Secret locker code

Day 33 | Celebrity murder mystery

Download the full resource here

Day 34 | Pairwise adding

Day 35 | Are they parallel?

Day 36 | From town to town

Day 37 | Initial Numbers

Day 38 | Midnight

Day 39 | Aunt’s old jalopy

Day 40 | Gift of gems

Day 41 | The Largest Number

Day 42 | Cross numbers

Main image credit: deviantart.org