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There’s at least one thing that teachers and middle schoolers can agree on: Learning should be fun! Whether you’re reviewing geometric proofs or guiding students through a class novel, an engaging activity is far more likely to make learning stick than regular lectures or textbook work.
Use these brain teasers for middle school students to push logic and critical thinking skills beyond their everyday lessons. High-quality resources featuring word puzzles, riddles, Rebus puzzles, and other types of brain teasers are sure to get those synapses firing — and those hands in the air!
Rousing Riddles for Middle Schoolers
Riddles for kids may be too easy for pre-teens, while riddles for high school students may be a little too tricky. Try these riddles as brain teasers for middle schoolers to practice their listening and logic skills.
- What uses keys but doesn’t lock?
- Tom hasn’t slept in 10 days, but he isn’t tired. Why not?
- A truck driver goes the wrong way on a one-way street, but no police officers stop him. Why not?
Use daily riddles to open your class period
Let kids know they’re in for a good time right when class starts! Riddles make great bell ringers or warm-ups that engage students right away, helping them transition into your next activity with ease.
Brain Teasers for Secondary Students | Puzzles | Riddles | Bell Ringers
By Meandering through the Middle
Grades: 5th-11th
Subjects: English Language Arts
Perfect as everyday warm-ups or Friday features, these brain teasers are sure to perk your middle schoolers up before or after your ELA lesson. The resource comes with 51 slides, including the cover slide, 25 brain teasers with answers.
Warm Up Games, Brain Teasers, and Brain Breaks – Perfect for Zoom
By Brain Waves Instruction
Grades: 4th-7th
Subjects: ELA Test Prep, Vocabulary
Need a no-prep way to get middle schoolers thinking critically? This resource has everything you need, including 100 riddle activities called “Brain Bursts” that work well as warm-ups, lesson extenders, enrichment activities, listening comprehension centers, and more.
Wacky Word Puzzles for Junior High
Even the most reluctant readers in your class can’t resist a good word puzzle. These brain teasers for middle school are especially fun in ELA classes, but they work anywhere in the schedule where students could use a challenge!
- Why are these words in order? FIT, LIPID, BIKINI, IVY, CAVE, EVIL
- They include increasing values of Roman numerals (FIT, LIPID, BIKINI, ALIVE, CAVE, EVIL)
- What five things always appear in a tennis court?
- The five vowels (A, E, I O, U)
- What starts with a P, ends with an E, and has thousands of letters?
Make sense from middle school word puzzles
When you’ve got a list of word puzzles to choose from, your class will always be students’ favorite of the day! Use these middle school word puzzles as classroom brain teasers when you’d like to get students really thinking. You can also use brain teasers for kids for students working on learning English as a second language.
Word Puzzles Brain Teasers – Fun Logic Rebus Puzzles Word Sense Brain Break Game
By Presto Plans
Grades: 5th-10th
Subjects: English Language Arts
Put middle schoolers’ logic skills to the test with 100 engaging puzzles for them to ponder. A thorough set of brain teasers challenges students to solve word-based puzzles, making them an excellent enrichment activity or a fun exercise for early finishers in the class.
Middle School Math Puzzles
Math can be puzzling for pre-teens — but that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun! Hand out math puzzles for middle school when you’re looking for entertaining ways to reinforce CCSS mathematics concepts, or to encourage students to think critically about the problem in front of them.
- If you multiply the number of toes that everyone on Earth has, how many toes do you get?
- 0 (because at least one person doesn’t have toes)
- When does 7 + 10 = 5?
- When 7 hours + 10:00 = 5:00
- How can you get to 1,000 using eight 8s?
- 888 + 88 + 8 + 8 + 8 = 1,000
Hone executive functioning skills with brain teasers
Students with strong executive functioning skills do well in math, language arts, and every other subject in their schedule. Use brain teaser resources designed to sharpen logic, planning, memory, and social-emotional learning skills to give middle schoolers a new perspective on their learning.
Executive Functioning Skills Brain Games Workbook, Activities, & Brainteasers
By Pathway 2 Success
Grades: 5th-9th
Subject: School Counseling
For brain teasers that boost student confidence and executive functioning, use a set of printable worksheets to target these important skills. Consider creating packets for students to complete on their own time, or pass out each worksheet at convenient times throughout the year.
Remarkable Rebus Puzzles for Middle Schoolers
A picture is worth a thousand words, especially when that picture is a Rebus puzzle! Often called pictograms or word picture puzzles, these middle school brain teasers challenge students in any subject to look between the lines and find out what phrase is represented in the puzzle.
- fLallOinVgE
- HIJKLMNO
- aPPlePie
- Piece (Ps) of apple pie
Use your imagination (and logic) with Rebus puzzles
Rebus puzzles are an amusing challenge for students who love pondering over a single clue for an answer that’s hidden in a word or picture. Use these Rebus puzzle activities as warm-ups, class activities, or a last test question for fun and extra credit.
Rebus Puzzles 1 Brain Teasers Printable and Easel Activity
By HappyEdugator
Grades: 5th-8th
Subjects: Reading, Vocabulary
Print a set of entertaining Rebus puzzles for students to complete for homework, for extra credit, or just for fun! The resource comes with a set of answer keys for quick solutions, as well as a blank template for middle schoolers to create their own Rebus puzzles.
Rebus Puzzles Brain Teasers Word Logic Brain Breaks PowerPoint & Slides
By Creativity and Assessment in ELA
Grades: 5th-12th
Subject: English Language Arts
If your middle schoolers can’t get enough Rebus puzzles (And who can?), use this thorough brain teaser resource to give them their fill. These slides challenge students to interpret 90 different puzzles as brain breaks or those moments when everyone needs a bit of a challenge to focus on the class ahead.
Incorporate brain teasers into speech practice
Brain teasers are an excellent way to practice and reinforce articulation in speech therapy. Whether you’re an SLP or a mainstream teacher, these brain teaser activities are an enjoyable way to incorporate important skill practice with logic challenges.
Articulation Activity Older Students Brain Teasers BOOM CARDS + Printable BUNDLE
By Stacy Crouse
Grades: 6th-12th
Designed for speech therapy students but ideal for mainstream middle schoolers as well, this articulation activity encourages students to solve riddles and practice speaking out loud. It includes 5 boom card decks and 5 printable PDFs, making it an easy, no-prep way to engage middle schoolers while practicing important articulation skills.
Perplexing Puzzle Bulletin Boards
If your curriculum is too jam-packed for brain teasers, let your bulletin boards do some of the work! Display these middle school brain teasers in your classrooms to encourage an inquiry-based learning approach, or to challenge students to solve puzzles in their free time.
Display these puzzles on the board for students to solve:
- Place printouts of numbers 0-9 on the board along with mathematical operations (+, -, x, ÷, =), write a desired solution, and have students rearrange the numbers to find the solution.
- Post clues to a logic grid puzzle along with handouts of the grid for students to solve.
- Print a series of words that are connected in some way (such as BERLIN, OTTAWA, PARIS) along with one word that doesn’t belong (such as BARCELONA). See if students can determine the word that doesn’t belong and can explain why.
Use brain teasers as classroom décor
Looking for a way to dress up that empty corner of the room? Use resources that include bulletin board ideas and printables to display in a “Brain Teaser” board setup.
Think o grams Rebus Puzzles Brain Teasers Plexers Bulletin Board
By Teaching High School Math
Grades: 7th-10th
Subjects: Math
Want to get students thinking logically all year long? Use this brain teaser resource to print and post a new puzzle for students to ponder all week long. Encourage groups to solve as many as they can, or give extra credit to students who come up with the answer!
Engage students’ minds with brain teasers and TPT
When you introduce brain teasers for middle school to your classroom, you’ll get better student engagement than ever before — all while honing the same logic and reasoning skills that middle schoolers will use in their core subjects. Find more middle school brain teaser resources to foster these important abilities.
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