What is a puzzle?

Collecting puzzles promotes the development of figurative and logical thinking, voluntary attention, perception, in particular, distinguishing individual elements by color, shape, size, etc.; teaches to correctly perceive the connection between part and whole; develops fine motor skills.

Types of puzzles

Currently, there are a large number of different types and modifications of puzzles. When collecting them, the goal is the same - to obtain a single picture from individual elements. Puzzles are divided by the size of the elements and the size of a single picture. The complexity of the puzzle within one number of elements is determined by the pattern, and the main criterion is the number of elements itself - the higher it is, the larger and more complex the puzzle.

The classic number of elements in a small puzzle is 54 (puzzles with approximately 260 elements are considered children's). The sizes of the puzzles range from small (about 50 cm²) to very large (several m²). For example, the standard size of a 500-piece puzzle is 47x33 cm.

There are large-sized puzzles made from a small number of elements especially for young children. Children's puzzles most often depict cartoon characters, or stills from cartoons.

Puzzles with more than 260 elements are aimed more at an adult audience. Accordingly, they can depict landscapes, erotic and fantastic scenes. There are puzzles with advertising pictures. Very large puzzles (over 6 thousand elements) usually depict scenes from the Bible, paintings by famous artists, and ancient geographical maps. They take quite a lot of time to assemble.

In addition to classic ones, there are three-dimensional (3D puzzles), “soft” (intended for children) and computer puzzles.

The protrusions of puzzle elements can be of various types. The most common ones have a rectangular shape (with protrusions and recesses), but there are elements of triangular, round, oval and other shapes.

3D puzzles

In 3M puzzles 3D jigsaw puzzle) a mosaic needs to be composed of many fragments of a pattern in three-dimensional space. Typically, 3M puzzles represent various architectural buildings and landmarks, as well as some types of equipment (cars, ships). The number of elements in such puzzles reaches 3046. Compiling a puzzle of 120 pieces takes about 3 hours. Puzzles are intended for children from 7 to 13 years old.

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Excerpt characterizing the Puzzle

Despite the dissuading of Dunyasha and the nanny, Princess Marya went out onto the porch. Dron, Dunyasha, the nanny and Mikhail Ivanovich followed her. “They probably think that I am offering them bread so that they will remain in their places, and I will leave myself, abandoning them to the mercy of the French,” thought Princess Marya. – I will promise them a month in an apartment near Moscow; I’m sure Andre would have done even more in my place,” she thought, approaching the crowd standing in the pasture near the barn in the twilight.
The crowd, crowded, began to stir, and their hats quickly came off. Princess Marya, with her eyes downcast and her feet tangling in her dress, came close to them. So many different old and young eyes were fixed on her and there were so many different faces that Princess Marya did not see a single face and, feeling the need to suddenly talk to everyone, did not know what to do. But again the consciousness that she was the representative of her father and brother gave her strength, and she boldly began her speech.
“I’m very glad that you came,” Princess Marya began, without raising her eyes and feeling how quickly and strongly her heart was beating. - Dronushka told me that you were ruined by the war. This is our common grief, and I will not spare anything to help you. I’m going myself, because it’s already dangerous here and the enemy is close... because... I give you everything, my friends, and I ask you to take everything, all our bread, so that you don’t have any need. And if they told you that I am giving you bread so that you can stay here, then this is not true. On the contrary, I ask you to leave with all your property to our Moscow region, and there I take it upon myself and promise you that you will not be in need. They will give you houses and bread. - The princess stopped. Only sighs were heard in the crowd.
“I’m not doing this on my own,” the princess continued, “I’m doing this in the name of my late father, who was a good master to you, and for my brother and his son.”
She stopped again. No one interrupted her silence.
- Our grief is common, and we will divide everything in half. “Everything that is mine is yours,” she said, looking around at the faces standing in front of her.
All eyes looked at her with the same expression, the meaning of which she could not understand. Whether it was curiosity, devotion, gratitude, or fear and distrust, the expression on all faces was the same.
“Many people are pleased with your mercy, but we don’t have to take the master’s bread,” said a voice from behind.
- Why not? - said the princess.
No one answered, and Princess Marya, looking around the crowd, noticed that now all the eyes she met immediately dropped.
- Why don’t you want to? – she asked again.
Nobody answered.
Princess Marya felt heavy from this silence; she tried to catch someone's gaze.
- Why don’t you talk? - the princess turned to the old man, who, leaning on a stick, stood in front of her. - Tell me if you think anything else is needed. “I’ll do everything,” she said, catching his gaze. But he, as if angry at this, lowered his head completely and said:
- Why agree, we don’t need bread.
- Well, should we give it all up? Do not agree. We don’t agree... We don’t agree. We feel sorry for you, but we do not agree. Go on your own, alone...” was heard in the crowd from different directions. And again the same expression appeared on all the faces of this crowd, and now it was probably no longer an expression of curiosity and gratitude, but an expression of embittered determination.
“You didn’t understand, right,” said Princess Marya with a sad smile. - Why don’t you want to go? I promise to house you and feed you. And here the enemy will ruin you...
But her voice was drowned out by the voices of the crowd.
“We don’t have our consent, let him ruin it!” We don’t take your bread, we don’t have our consent!
Princess Marya again tried to catch someone's gaze from the crowd, but not a single glance was directed at her; the eyes obviously avoided her. She felt strange and awkward.
- See, she taught me cleverly, follow her to the fortress! Destroy your home and go into bondage and go. Why! I'll give you the bread, they say! – voices were heard in the crowd.
Princess Marya, lowering her head, left the circle and went into the house. Having repeated the order to Drona that there should be horses for departure tomorrow, she went to her room and was left alone with her thoughts.

When today some people (mostly, as a rule, the older generation) ask you to explain in a nutshell what a puzzle is, you won’t be able to answer clearly right away. On the one hand, yes, this is a mosaic that folds into a single image, although, often, the same abstraction can be put together from the proposed parts, only with the risk of spoiling the details. =) On the other hand, in most “classical” mosaics the elements still had an identical shape and differed only in color, but in modern puzzles the segments have different sizes and contours. You can, of course, as an example, recall the half-forgotten film “Moscow Evenings” by Todorovsky Jr., where the heroine of Alisa Brunovna Freindlich (according to the plot - a terribly successful writer) had fun at the dacha with a game little known in our latitudes: she tried to put together a picture in a bizarre way cut into many pieces. Here! An excellent definition: a puzzle is a kind of symbiosis of a mosaic and a puzzle, where a person (or a group of people) is asked to put together a picture that was figuratively cut earlier into many components.
As the ubiquitous Wikipedia says, puzzles contribute to the development of logical thinking, memory, attention, imagination, etc. Again, don’t forget about fine motor skills (see raising children) - also an important factor. Just don’t think that playing puzzles is exclusively children’s fun: a very rare young child will be able to put together a picture consisting of several hundred elements. But, thanks to modern manufacturers, there are currently countless varieties of these puzzles being produced, designed for all kinds of age categories, well, maybe nothing has been published just for infants yet.

Types of puzzles

Thus, a natural need arises to somehow classify the types of puzzles. So, there are flat puzzles designed to be assembled on a flat surface - on a table, for example, as well as three-dimensional puzzles - in the form of a ball, for example (many people really like to collect a globe or an apple), as well as in the form of a cube, pyramid, tube, etc. .P. Accordingly, puzzle pieces can be made from various materials: wood, plastic, made of foam rubber, metal, etc. And, of course, the most popular ones are made from cardboard.
You can also differentiate puzzles by degree of difficulty. The complexity of the puzzles is determined by the picture itself proposed for composing (for example, putting together just a clean, monochromatic sky is much more difficult than the periodic table, where all the chemical elements are arranged in a certain order), as well as the number of segments: putting together twenty pieces is easier than two thousand.
The word “puzzle” itself translated from English means a riddle, a rebus, a conundrum, as well as difficulty, confusion - this is used as a noun. But the verb “to puzzle” is translated as to puzzle, confuse, complicate, perplex. It is clear why domestic linguists did not come up with some Russian analogue of this very multifaceted term. Once upon a time, by the way, the great Nabokov tried to introduce the word “crossword” into the Russian language instead of the Western “crossword” - it didn’t take root.

History of puzzles

The Englishman John Spilsbury, a merchant of geographical maps, is officially considered the creator of puzzles. IN 1761 (!) year, John came up with the idea of ​​gluing his product onto a thin wooden backing, figuratively sawing the resulting “sandwich” into many pieces and selling this business as a teaching aid for studying geography. And indeed: the student took a separate piece of the map and composed it with others (you need to understand that a hand-cut image could not, by definition, contain elements absolutely identical in shape and size) - thus the knowledge of who with who borders, what flows where, etc. And for two and a half centuries now, many people have been devoting their leisure time to collecting a single picture from a different number of small details. And today all sorts of subjects are used as these very pictures. For children, everything is quite simple: cartoon and fairy tale characters, animals, cars, flowers, but adults do not limit themselves to the same geographical maps or mountain/sea landscapes. Classic picturesque works of art, panoramas of museums, fantastic sketches, erotic photographs, biblical scenes - absolutely anything that comes to mind is used to create puzzles these days. Many, by the way, do not burden themselves with the tangible task of collecting an entire home collection of puzzles, but download puzzles on the Internet (yes, there are computer puzzles!) and play so-called “online puzzles” on the computer.

Puzzle, puzzle game, accidentally invented by English cartographer John Spilsbury in 1766. He glued the map to the board, when suddenly it occurred to him that it could be cut along the borders of countries with a thin saw. Which he immediately did. This is how John Spilsbury created individual countries that formed a huge map. He brought his puzzle to the students to whom he taught geography. While collecting it, they studied geography with great pleasure.

First puzzle.

At the end of the nineteenth century, artistic puzzles were also created for adults. They instantly became a favorite pastime of high society. The puzzles were wooden and cut by hand. The puzzle elements did not have protrusions, so they were assembled differently than modern puzzles, but more cunningly.

These original and elegant entertainments of extraordinary beauty and exclusivity were used to surprise guests. Among wealthy people, puzzles were part of heritage and family traditions. At that time such puzzles were very expensive.

With the advent of cardboard puzzles and new production technologies, they have become cheaper. In the 20-30s of the twentieth century, puzzles became very popular game.

Today, manufacturers of goods for children provide us with a huge selection of board games on a variety of topics - from simple “adventure games” to quite complex educational products. Perhaps the most popular are puzzles, not only among children, but also among adults.

The history of creating puzzles begins not so long ago. The idea of ​​assembling a picture from its fragments belongs to John Spilsbury (1739-1769). He lived in London and was engaged in the production of geographical maps. One day Spilsbury decided to cut the world map along the borders of states. The map fragments were not fastened together, but laid out on a wooden board. Spilsbury puzzles began to be used as a teaching aid in geography. Although today it can hardly be used for teaching, since since then Antarctica, which was discovered only in the 19th century, and Australia, little studied at that time, have appeared on modern maps. Thus, two of the six continents were missing.

As we have already said, the puzzle was laid out on a wooden board, but over time it was replaced with cardboard in order to reduce the cost of the puzzle.

Puzzles in the form we are familiar with appeared only in 1909, when the American company Parker Brothers began their industrial production. Over time, the puzzle conquered the whole world. Today on store shelves you can find puzzles with images on various topics, holographic puzzles and even 3D.

The word “puzzle” in Russian has a narrower definition than in English. Translated, “puzzle” means “riddle, task,” so the British understand by this word not only this, but also other types of puzzles. People who have made a significant contribution to the popularization of puzzles are awarded the international Spilsbury Prize. In addition, international competitions in puzzle solving are held.

Tell me, do you collect pictures from pieces - puzzles? Amazing for kids and adults. For many years now, they have become the favorite toys - puzzles of many children. The most important thing is that puzzles can be selected for children of any age, even adults! In addition, it is a wonderful pastime to put together a puzzle; time passes both usefully and brings together those who play together...

And what a wide selection of these mosaics today: electronic, magnetic, wooden, association games...

What is a puzzle?

Puzzle is a picture cut into many parts. “Puzzle” comes from the English word puzzle, which means puzzle. The puzzle is a wonderful puzzle for adults and children. The toy, accessible to any pocket, develops imagination, memory, thinking, fine motor skills, perseverance and attentiveness.

Origin of the puzzle

Puzzle was born in England in 1761 and was originally a textbook for the study of geographical maps. And the creator of the puzzle is considered to be John Spilsbury, a London merchant of geographical maps, who began to paste geographical maps onto a wooden base and cut the resulting sandwich into pieces of bizarre shapes. By collecting the entire map in this way, the student comprehended all the subtleties of geographical science.

Types of puzzles

Today these most bizarre pieces live in every home. There are puzzles for every taste and color. Modern manufacturers produce countless variations of puzzles from a wide variety of materials, shapes and sizes. By the way, this toy can grow with the child.

The choice of puzzles today is not only the classic cardboard mosaic picture. For the little ones, you can find three-dimensional puzzles, soft rugs, wooden boards in which you need to find a place for different animals, vegetables or fruits. For older children, there are glow-in-the-dark puzzles, and even ones that need to be assembled and viewed with 3D glasses. There are puzzles with rhinestones for girls. For older children and adults, three-dimensional pyramids, balls, ships, castles, and cars are offered.

Application of the puzzle

Puzzle- an undeniably useful toy that trains attention and memory. And how right the creator of the cut-up pictures was, the puzzle is a wonderful teaching tool. With its help, you can introduce preschool children to the classification of objects, shapes and colors, counting, letters, and a foreign language. Schoolchildren can be taught sentence composition, multiplication tables, reading, geography, as in the original, and much more.

Many people turn collecting pictures into a hobby, which over time turns into an entire art. In the country's museums you can find mosaics made from glass shards, bottle caps, and even garbage.

Original gift - puzzle

Today, many photo salons offer services to their customers for making a puzzle from a photograph. This is a wonderful and original gift for both adults and children.

And recently I came across an interesting Internet resource http://puzzleit.org/. Here you can assemble a puzzle online from any picture you want. to do this, you simply download it from your computer and enjoy the game.

How are pictures made from pieces useful?

Puzzles develop imagination, spatial orientation, coordination of movements, fine motor skills, thinking, patience, perseverance, attentiveness... And these skills will definitely come in handy during kindergarten and school activities, games, communication with peers and competitions.

For children from one to 3 years old, puzzles with empty spaces that need to be filled with large figures are most suitable. The child uses the outline to determine what to put where. These are the so-called insert frames. These can be animals, fruits, vegetables.

How to play with puzzles?

Make up a fairy tale!

To interest your child in assembling the picture, you can come up with a simple one. For example:

Collecting pictures will thus also develop speech, imagination, and the ability to express one’s thoughts.

Have a competition!

Older children can be attracted to puzzle games through competitions with... their parents! Buy several identical pictures and see who can complete the picture faster. Playing with mom and dad is a great opportunity to have fun, and will also help unite the family with a common hobby.

Make your own puzzle!

Making a puzzle yourself is no less interesting, and not at all difficult. To do this, you need to find a beautiful bright picture (cut from a children's magazine, or take a child's drawing for this) and glue it onto an A4 sheet of cardboard. Then cut your picture into several geometric shapes.

Having made the game with your own hands, the child will assemble it with even more enthusiasm!

Puzzles made from family photographs have a stunning effect. Today you can order a service for creating a puzzle from a photograph in almost any city.

The main thing is to choose a puzzle in accordance with the age of the child. The task should be moderately difficult and interesting for the child.

And after the theory, I suggest you and your child assemble a digital puzzle right now! Such puzzles are also useful and interesting!

Have amazing communication with children!

With warmth,