Brain Teasers

This month’s brain teaser is not so bad! Yes, it requires thought (reasoning!), but it is doable. Give it a try! You have a three gallon and a five gallon measuring device. You can fill the containers with water as many times as you like or pour...

There are 1000 lockers in a high school with 1000 students. The problem begins with the first student opening all 1000 lockers; next the second student closes lockers 2,4,6,8,10 and so on to locker 1000; the third student changes the state (opens lockers...

This month’s brain teaser is on the “easier” side (though it is still a brain teaser: hint, hint).  As in previous newsletters, it’s also typical of the type of questions you see on standardized tests, especially the GMAT and GRE: If 4 hens can lay...

Club X has more than 10 but fewer than 40 members. Sometimes the members sit at tables with 3 members at one table and 4 members at each of the other tables, and sometimes they sit at tables with 3 members at one table and 5 members at each of the other...

A census taker approaches a house and asks the woman who answers the door "How many children do you have, and what are their ages?" The woman says, "I have three children; the product of their ages is 36, and the sum of their ages is equal to the address of...

This month we switch back to a more quantitative brain teaser. It’s also typical of the type of question one sees on the GMAT and GRE, for reasons that we explain in the answer explanation. Are you up for the challenge? When a clock is at 3:15, what is the...

Brain teasers and puzzles often have a more quantitative bent (and test-takers similarly obsess more about the quantitative sections of the SAT, ACT, GMAT, and GRE), so in this month’s newsletter we present a question that is more “verbal” in...

Don was driving his tractor-trailer under an overpass when suddenly he came to a screeching halt. Don wasn’t paying enough attention and inadvertently drove under an overpass that was just barely as high as his truck. The tractor-trailer was wedged so...

In ancient Egypt, there were magical lily ponds. On these ponds, each flower doubled overnight. For example, if a pond had one flower on a certain day, the next day there would be two flowers (both the same size as the original flower). On March 1, a single...