Cat Stax

Cat Stax - The purrfect puzzle

Calling all cat lovers - Cat Stax is a one-person brainteaser that will tickle your cat fancy. Each puzzle card shows a colored grid and a number of specific cats at the top. Using those cats, lay them on the grid so that there are no empty spaces and no cats are overlapping or hanging off the grid. The cats can face any direction, front or back, north, south, east or west. 

The puzzles increase in difficulty as you go and include beginner, intermediate, advanced, and expert. The card will indicate if the cats are to be arranged in two, three, or four layers! Multiple layer puzzles can include cats that are standing up as well as lying down. 

There is a puzzle on one side of each puzzle card and a solution on one side of each solution card. The solution is not on the back of the same card with the puzzle so that you can check your results without having to turn the card over. 

I have not ended up using this puzzle much for therapy as the cats slide around on the card too much. The cats are relatively small, slick and close together in the finished puzzle. If you place a cat and find out a few cats later that it doesn't work in that position, it is hard to remove that cat without disturbing the other cats around it. This can end up being frustrating as different arrangements are tried.

Try this:

• Design and print out your own background grid so the pieces don't slide and aren't crowded together. A great suggestion from a fellow therapist. `
• Solve a puzzle or two with the individual looking on before giving it to him to solve. Think out loud as you try different pieces or strategies to help teach problem solving.
• Do a couple puzzles from the solution card to get the hang of it and show how the cats can be oriented in different directions.
• Use just the solution side of the puzzles for kids who aren't able to solve the puzzles, to practice with fine motor and spatial skills. Just have them place the cats on the card as pictured on the solution. Can still be tricky to get all the cats in place without disturbing surrounding cats. 
• Solve one puzzle as the individual looks on as above. Problem solve out loud as you go.Then mix up the pieces and ask the individual to solve the same puzzle.
  
• If there is more than one layer to the answer, place the cats for the second and third layers on the tabletop as you figure them out and then put them on the stack(s) on the card after you have figured out the arrangement. It will be hard to pick up cats in layers without disturbing cats underneath as you work with trial and error.
• Start a puzzle. Add all but the last cat. Allow the individual to lay the last cat. Then start a puzzle and add all but the last two cats. Repeat adding one less cat each time and allowing the individual to finish. Use the solution card for a faster game.
  
• Work on visual discrimination, visual closure, spatial relations, visual form constancy, manual dexterity, precise fine motor control, logic, problem solving, process skills, executive functioning skills, play and leisure exploration and interaction

In the box: 12 plastic cats, 24 puzzle cards (48 puzzles total), 24 solution cards (48 solutions total), plastic carrying case
Ages 8+, 1 player

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