Are You Ready to Celebrate National Gingerbread House Day in Your Math Classroom This Year?

Did you know that December 12th of every year is National Gingerbread House Day?

This festive holiday celebrates the tradition (traced back as far as the 1600s!) of creating edible houses out of gingerbread cookies, candy, and frosting!

You can at celebrate at home by building your very own gingerbread house with friends, family, and loved ones.

And you can celebrate in your classroom with TWO fun gingerbread-themed math puzzles for students in grades 1-8!

Why? Because sharing Christmas-themed math puzzles and activities (like the 12 Days of Holiday Math Challenges for Grades 1-8 ) is a great way to keep your students engaged and focused on learning math during the weeks leading up to winter vacation.

The 1st Gingerbread House Day Activity is a Multiplication Table Puzzle.

The 2nd Gingerbread House Day Activity is an Order of Operations Puzzle.

Add these activities into your upcoming lessons as warm-ups and/or cool-downs, transitions, extra credit assignments, and homework and watch your students’ engagement skyrocket! Enjoy :)

1.) Gingerbread House Day Multiplication Table

This activity challenges students to use their understanding of multiplication and fact fluency to discover the value of various symbols. Multiple symbols can share the same value. Multiplication tables are read like a bingo card, where the value or symbol in each box represents the product of the corresponding column and row.

*Keep reading to see the solution.

2.) Gingerbread House Day Order of Operations Puzzle

This puzzle requires students to apply their understanding of the order of operations, mathematical reasoning, and logical thinking to find the value of each symbol and the ‘?’

Learn More: Why is GEMS the Best Way to Teach Order of Operations?

*Keep reading to see the solution.

Today’s math puzzles are samples from the best-selling Mashup Math workbook 101 Math Challenges for Engaging Your Students in Grades 3-8.

You can get a copy as a PDF download and/or as a hard copy on Amazon (with free prime shipping!)