During summer breaks, students can forget part of what they learned in the preceding year.  This phenomenon is referred to as the ‘summer learning loss’ or ‘learning slide’.  There is a significant body of literature on it, particularly as it affects K-12 students.  Estimates of the severity of the loss differ greatly depending on the test design, but it is a risk worth preparing against.  One proposed solution calls for eliminating or reducing summer breaks. Locally, Richmond Community Schools now schedules a two-month summer vacation.  Other proposals include having more frequent, but shorter, breaks spaced throughout the year; or using summer school to bolster at-risk kids. 

Absent a comprehensive community solution, however, a good strategy is to keep your mind active and challenged.  A direct way of doing so can be to continue to study the previous year’s materials; however, that risks learner fatigue.  An endeavor that may be more fun or rewarding,  whether young and old, is to use riddles, puzzles, and brainteasers to hone mental acuity. 

The library offers many puzzle books of different kinds to aid in keeping your mind sharp and supple, whether for K-12 or college students.  Some serve a general audience, stimulating broad logic skills.  Titles of this type include A Cabinet of Philosophical Curiosities: A Collection of Puzzles, Oddities, Riddles, and Dilemmas by Roy Sorensen, The Pocket Book of Frame Games: Hundreds of Mind-Bending Word Puzzles from the King of Brainteasers by Terry Stickels, and 101 Amazing Brainteasers: Riddles and Puzzles for All Ages by Jack Goldstein.

Some specialize in challenging mathematics or science skills.  Possibilities include Quantum Quandaries: 100 Brainteasers from Quantum: the Magazine of Math and Science by Timothy Weber, Algorithmic Puzzles by Anany Levitin, Riddles of the Sphinx and Other Mathematical Puzzle Tales by Martin Gardner, and Puzzles 101: A PuzzleMasters Challenge by Nobuyuki Yoshigahara.

Others celebrate a specific culture and its own characteristic logic.  Some examples include Riddles, Folktales and Proverbs from Cameroon by Comfort Ashu, Brainteasers from Jewish Folklore by Rosalind Charney Kaye, and Rusties and Riddles and Gee-Haw Whimmy-Diddles by James Still.

Still others look at historical puzzles, often with a more academic outlook.  Some examples include Unriddling the Exeter Riddles by Patrick J. Murphy or Reading Riddles: Rhetorics of Obscurity from Romanticism to Freud by Brian Tucker.

If you’d like to improve your mental acuity with puzzles, the library can help keep your mind sharp this summer.  If you need help finding more information, Ask Us at iueref@iue.edu or click this button:

Answers to the riddles:

Subsurface Tension riddle solution

Seed to Sow riddle solution

River Crossing riddle solution

What Is It? riddle solution