Which gift? Playing Secret Santa consists of two logic puzzles; Secret Santa boys and Secret Santa girls.
The story children play a pretend game of Secret Santa. They take toys from the shelf, wrap them in Christmas paper, and give them to each other as pretend gifts.
The children’s job is to work out who gave what gift to which child, and what paper it was wrapped in.
The puzzles can be used with the whole class to introduce children to the steps involved in completing logic puzzles. They can be used in conjunction with each other or independently; or use one to introduce children to logic puzzles and provide one for practice.
Alternatively, they make a great independent or buddy activity if children already know how to complete logic puzzles on their own.
Great for reading comprehension and creative thinking; and for collaboration in a paired activity!
Logic puzzles are great for developing thinking skills, and they involve the use of other skills in an integrated way.
Logic puzzles require children to:
- read and interpret the information provided in each clue
- determine which parts of the information are relevant and which can be ignored
- relate new information from subsequent clues to what is already known
- record details to make sense of data
- understand and use the grid layout of a table
- make deductions based on information rather than guesswork
- think creatively.
