More than 50 million people in the United States play crosswords regularly, count me in as one of them! I have tried them all; online, newspapers, magazines, daily crossword books…oh my! My skill has increased over time, but I had done thousands before I finally completed one (with no crossword dictionary, friendly assistance or any otherwise cheating). Ok…so, maybe the one I completed wasn’t the NY Times, which is regarded as “expert”, but all the spaces were filled in with the correct words and that’s what counts!
If you are interested, you can create your own crossword puzzle pretty easily online. I used to make my own when I was a staff trainer, it was a fantastic way to teach something in a fun way.
TIPS ON SOLVING CROSSWORD PUZZLES
1. Use a pencil for those answers you are unsure of.
2. Start by filling in all the obvious answers first, then move to the harder.
3. Look for plural clues & put an “S” where the last letter of the answer should be.
4. If the puzzle has a theme, keep it in mind as you are reading the clues
5. Walk away for a little while to refresh your mind.
RESOURCES & FUN PRODUCTS
The Big Brain Puzzle Book (The Alzheimer’s Association), assorted puzzles used to stimulate your brain and keep it active!
Food & Wine Lovers Puzzle & Quiz Book, the perfect puzzle book for all you foodies like me!
The New York Times Supersized Book, 500 puzzles
The Million Word Crossword Dictionary, one of the largest available
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I used to love doing these when I had more vision and could do the large print ones. I love words so this was my choice in school over math problems. :-)
Ooh la la! I really like the idea of being meticulous and having an out-of-the-box mentality which would certainly help us to solve any kind of crossword puzzle. My nephew’s daughter is so into that kind of stuff lately after being introduced to it by her teacher. I’ll surely get her something similar from a trusted outlet very soon so she could spend her free time wisely.