I received the Critical Thinking magazine in the mail. I was looking through it and I found the Mind Benders books/software (http://www.criticalthinking.com/series/013/index_c.jsp) I am thinking about buying the book unless I can find them free online. Anyone used them or know where to get them online free. Thanks
I have seen this and I wanted to purchase but I think I have too much already. I will be watching this thread.
We purchased a mind bender book a good while ago, and read them while traveling to New England. The kids had a blast trying to figure them out. I would read it, and Carl could even take place while driving. Phillip was a preschooler at the time. One story told about a woman who put on a "heavy coat" and then left even though it was a very hot day. The answer was that she was painting her house and had put on a coat of paint. But Phillip had a unique thought! He wondered if she weren't a fireman, and was putting on the coat that was part of her fire gear. I thought that was very creative by one so young! And another one, the first thing Rachael said was, "I know this sounds really far out, but could it have anything to do with a chess game....?" And she was RIGHT ON!!! It was so cool seeing my kids thinking outside the box!
We use them every year. We'll be starting our new ones next week. I have no idea where you'd get them for free, but you can probably do a search for logic puzzles for kids and find some free equivalents out there.
Never tried them but they have a new one "Balance Benders" that I want to try...when the price goes down
I have used the books with both of my children. For Mind Benders we used level A for grades 3 - 6 and level B for grade 6 - 12. We also used Building Thinking Skills Book 1 for grades 4 - 7. I plan on purchasing Book 3 for grades 7 - adult. I am going to see what Balance Bender is about. Sounds interesting.
You can go to the critical thinking website and try out a bunch of sample pages to see what works. We've been using their resources as a 1-2x a week supplement to whatever we are doing that day, usually piggy backing on math.
I hear that!!! Again, we use them while traveling. When you're in a car for two days straight, it's a very pleasant change. (And I don't have a DVD player in our car; won't have one!!!)
We use them and the kids LOVE it. It doesn't take a lot of my time. My son and daughter can work through them on their own and then I check it and if they didn't get it right we go through it together and find where they made a mistake. We also do Red Herring which is what Jackie was describing; it's like the game 20 questions, but the scenarios can be really challenging to guess. The Mind Benders on the other hand teach the kids how to think through a problem using a organizational grid. I think it is wonderful. However, it is pricey considering that there are only about 15 problems per book, but you don't have to write in the book and can resell it.
Oh, I'm thinking the wrong thing! Sorry!!! We also have the Mind Bender book, which is why I confused them. It's been a long time!!! http://www.logic-puzzles.org/ http://www.braingle.com/Logic-Grid.html http://www.thekidzpage.com/learninggames/logic_games/logic-game-petcenter.html The first place is the one I do every day, but could be too difficult for children. The middle one has a bunch at different levels. The third are faily simple.
