This month's activity is one of a large family of puzzles that deals with dividing a region into parts according to some rule. These puzzles are known as dissection puzzles and range from being moderately difficult to being almost impossible, at least for those of us without well-developed spatial skills. Because of this, dissection puzzles are not very popular with many people. This is a shame, for they present an excellent opportunity for those who persist to develop spatial skills.

This particular puzzle also deals with the mathematical property of similarity. The challenge in the puzzle is to divide the large region into four smaller, similar ones. To make this dissection puzzle less frustrating for students, it is presented here in a modified form. The addition of the grid allows them to use some simple mathematical reasoning to aid them in dissecting the region. Students can use the area of the large region (80 square units) to calculate that each smaller region has 20 square units. This knowledge should make this normally quite difficult puzzle much more manageable for most. To demonstrate this, a second version of the puzzle without the grid - the type most often found in puzzle books - is included here. This second version can be used for those students who are already good at spatial problems and need an extra challenge. It can also be used for students to take home for their parents to solve.