This month's Puzzle Corner activity has a holiday theme. In it, students are presented with a paradoxical scenario and asked to try to make sense of it. In this scenario a child is hiding under a table at her parent's holiday party. Looking out, she can count 20 legs and thus knows there are 10 adults in the room. A little while later, all the adults move to another room, yet the girl is still able to see six legs. The challenge is to determine how this is possible.
Students may come up with some very creative solutions to this puzzle, and that should not be discouraged. For example, they might say that she could see three adults in the other room through and open door, or three children come into the room, or that she can see an insect crawling on the floor under the table. These explanations are fine, since they show students are creative in their attempts to solve the paradox. There is, however, a fairly straightforward solution to this puzzle.
I hope that you and your class find this puzzle enjoyable.
