A Truly Gifted Teacher?
Situation puzzles (sometimes called lateral thinking puzzles) are ones where you need to ask lots of yes or no questions to figure out what happened in the situation. These are good puzzles for groups where one person knows the puzzle and answers the questions.
Last week, the local Primary school was visited by the Government School Inspector who was there to check that teachers were performing well in their respective classes.
He was very impressed with one particular teacher. The Inspector noticed that each time the class teacher asked a question, every child in the class put up their hands enthusiastically to answer it.
More surprisingly, whilst the teacher chose a different child to answer the questions each time, the answers were always correct.
Why would this be?
Hint1. The class teacher asked many questions.
2. All the children were normal kids and all of them raised their hands.
3. The children were not prompted beforehand with the questions or answers.
4. Not all the children knew the answers, but they still put up their hands.
Hide
Answer
The children were instructed to ALL raise their hands whenever a question was asked. It did not matter whether they knew the answer or not.
If they did not know the answer, however, they would raise their LEFT hand.
If they knew the answer, they would raise their RIGHT hand.
The class teacher would choose a different child each time, but always the ones who had their RIGHT hand raised.
Hide
Comments
catfood99   
Jun 03, 2008
| Great teaser!  It was a bit tricky in a good way. |
tommysmo
Jun 03, 2008
| I figured there was a system. I just didn't have the right system figured out! |
nosnibor 
Jun 03, 2008
| It's more fun than usual, but basic. |
4demo
Jun 03, 2008
| Clever [teacher and teaser]! |
jazzmusician46  
Jun 04, 2008
|  Demo: I must remember this when the principal decides to call in on one of my classes!
|
Zozo_The_Zo
Jun 04, 2008
| kewlio |
ANATOLIUS
Jun 04, 2008
| Pretty good fella....Thanks!  |
SweetAshleyGirl
Jun 04, 2008
| WOW love that teaser! It stumpped me thought!  whoever thought of that is a geneous!  |
lorpen 
Jun 05, 2008
| Brilliant! |
Brian2772 
Jun 05, 2008
| That's a really good teaser! |
psychoserenity
Jun 06, 2008
| Going by the title I thought the teacher was psychic or something. 
Great teaser! |
jazzmusician46
Jun 06, 2008
| Thanks |
SweetAshleyGirl
Jun 07, 2008
| LOVE IT! |
SweetAshleyGirl
Jun 07, 2008
| IT WAS GREAT! |
kunju 
Jun 14, 2008
| loved it
thanks  |
chandesmiles
Jun 14, 2008
| l
lo
lov
love
love i
love it
love it!
love it
love i
love
lov
lo
l |
jazzmusician46
Jun 15, 2008
| Thanks for that. What a lovely reply chandesmiles |
zxyggrhyn
Aug 24, 2008
|
I watch sitcoms that's why it went out to be THAT easy.
But what would happen if all pupils raised their left hand? Oh no! What ould he do?!?!
Great teaser! |
(user deleted)
Aug 29, 2008
| got it
it was easy for me, since this is exactly what we would do when a group came to inspect our school! HAHA. our teachers didn`t encourage it though |
Wa11E
Sep 18, 2008
| Goodun! |
KarateGirl098
Sep 21, 2008
| Good one! |
Johnny
Nov 09, 2008
| I probably would've never figured this out. There is too much of a system in the answer. |
NDYApeacock
Nov 30, 2008
| I thought it was because the teacher asked questions that the teacher knew a particualr student would know.
What would happen if a student thought they knew the answer (maybe because the student was taught incorrectly) and raised their right hand?
Nice teaser |
here2
Dec 20, 2008
| thanks. |
Arikiko
Jan 03, 2009
| Not completely flawless, but still clever. If the student thought they had the right answer but didn't that wouldn't work. Also, if none of the students knew the answer, that would be a problem. Furthermore, if only one student knew the answer for a number of consecutive questions, it would look strange for the teacher to always pick the same student when all his/her classmates "knew" the answer. But still clever! |
precious1026
Mar 04, 2009
|  The Inspector was exploring Teachers in "Their" respective fields, is good advice, Mr. Jazzman.
For any teacher to commit to coaching her students in any manner, which indicates answering correctly or incorrectly in front of School Officials is considered "Cheating." It does not matter if there is pen and paper, but the inference is Cheating to make the children Appear to know when in all actuality they do know, but their knowledge is unethical, coached and the Teacher cheats by not acknowledging those students that do not know the answer. |
precious1026
Mar 04, 2009
| Secondly, This is NOT a system of any kind. Well I guess it is a system for some, but not the intelligent. |
Jimbo
Mar 26, 2009
| A good teacher can create more learning from an incorrect answer than a correct one! |
lovelost1325
Nov 09, 2009
| my 3rd grade teacher did this but we rised our LEFT hands if we knew the answer heh |
omas
Dec 30, 2009
| I would have made a twist in the riddle, by allowing the school inspector to ask questions. In that way, it would not appear to the inspector that the questions were rehearsed beforehand by the teacher.
Great teaser by the way!!
nonetheless, I would not encourage such behaviour in any school as it is not true learning!! |
Marijah
Jun 29, 2010
| HAH!! THIS ONE IS SOOO AWESOME! |
Angelina8423
Nov 27, 2010
| This one is very enthusiastic and clever! I liked it! |
Angelina8423
Nov 27, 2010
| P.S. The teacher is kind of cheating.... |
Vervet
May 21, 2011
| A trick I know of (this was some time ago but heard it first hand) was to have the pupils take out their exercise books, select a page where they had done some really good work, turn the book face down and sit on for a morning. If the Inspector opened it, it would naturally fall open at this page. |
Candi7
Jun 21, 2012
| What if they THOUGHT they knew the answer, but they got it WRONG? |
30angel100
Nov 08, 2012
| I never would have guessed. |
Back to Top
| |
|
