The Tower of Hanoi is a brain puzzle designed to test and challenge the mathematical reasoning abilities of the player. The puzzle consists of three rods and six various-sized stacking rings placed on the rod furthest to the left, with the smallest ring at the top of the stack. The objective of the game is to have the rings all stacked on the rod located at the furthest right. The player can move only one ring at a time and place it on any rod. However, a larger ring cannot be placed on top of a smaller ring. The goal is to stack all the rings with the least amount of movements. The game can also be modified to include more or less rings.
The game of Sudoku seems to have just gained its popularity within the last twenty years. However, this game of logic and reasoning has been around since the late 1800s. The object of the game is to fill a 9-by-9 number grid with digits so that each row and column contains all the digits from one to nine. Students who play this game can practice stretching their logic skills, and can also compete with each other to determine the fastest completion time.
In the game of StickLinks, the student must connect letters together to form words that are part of a quote. The quote is placed in a grid and all the letters form a continuous line so that the student does not have to pick up his pencil to link the letters. Lines are drawn off to the side or at the bottom of the grid so that the student can fill in the blanks as he discovers the quote. The StickLinks puzzle does not require the use of numbers, but still challenges the student to make logical connections needed for mathematical reasoning.
Games involving analogies are also a great way to stimulate the mind. Students are provided with three words or numbers and asked to figure out how they relate to each other. The games can start off simple, gradually increasing in difficulty.