Group Activity Cards

Statistics and Probability Use groups of 4. Materials: Dictionaries

Puzzling Permutations

A popular puzzle found in many newspapers contains words whose letters have been scrambled. Sometimes you can unscramble the words in your head. Another strategy, especially for words you do not know, is to list all of the permutations of the letters. One of the permutations will be the unscrambled word.

Working in pairs, unscramble each of the words below. Since these words are not common, you may want to list all of the permutations and then look up the possibilities in a dictionary. Try to be the first pair to unscramble all three words.