Christmas activities

Teaching Logic to Primary Students

I believe teaching students how to think logically is so very important. Logical thinking developes skills in problem solving, making inferences, drawing conclusions, recognizing similarities and differences, and comparing and contrasting. I have always used matrix logic puzzles with my students to introduce them to logical thinking. I think matric puzzles are one of the easiest ways to introduce logic problems. I have seen many resources that simply give the problem and clues, but there is no matrix. The matrix is critical to helping students understand the reasoning involved in solving the problems. For example, if you answer “yes” on a column or row, all the other squares on the column or row should have “no” answers.

To help primary students learn how to develop logical reasoning, I have developed a set of 25 logic problems around a Christmas theme. What better way to get kids excited about logic! There are different levels of difficulty, to provide opportunities to differentiate for the varying ability levels in your classroom. The matrix logic puzzles begin with 2 X 2 grid puzzles and progress to 3 X 3 grid puzzles; however, once the students are exposed to the puzzles, everyone should be able to complete all of them. I suggest beginning with the easiest puzzles as a group activity to develop practice and confidence in solving matrix logic puzzles. They print out beautifully in grayscale so you don’t use color ink.

There are so many ways you can use these in your classroom – as a group activity in the morning for a problem of the day activity, in a center, or activities for those earlier finishers.

Here’s what you will get:

25 puzzles in all (6 Christmas Sudoku picture puzzles and 19 matrix logic puzzles)
Candy cards for Sudoku picture puzzles
Yes/no cards for logic puzzles
Answer keys
Sheets to record responses

Click on the preview below to see these puzzles and to download a preview!