Riddles for Children
How to keep children occupied without resorting to a smartphone.
Riddles are not only fun but can also boost children’s verbal fluency and creative thinking. Riddles typically rely on unusual perspectives and / or using words with veiled or multiple meanings. Please email us new ones and we'll add them to the list.
See also: Classroom Humour
- I am always running, but never get tired or hot. What am I?
Answer: a refrigerator - You’re running a race and at the very end, you pass the person in 2nd place. What place did you finish the race in?
Answer: 2nd place - If I have it, I don’t share it. If I share it, I don’t have it. What is it?
Answer: a secret - It’s the only place in the world where today comes before yesterday. Where is it?
Answer: a dictionary - I go all around the world, but never leave the corner. What am I?
Answer: a stamp - I have a head and tail, but no body. What am I?
Answer: a coin - If you don't keep me, I break. What am I?
Answer: a promise - It belongs to you, but your friends use it more. What is it?
Answer: your name - You’ll find me in Mercury, Earth, Mars and Jupiter, but not in Venus or Neptune. What am I?”
Answer: the letter 'R' - What is so fragile that saying its name breaks it?
Answer: silence - After a train crashed, every single person died. Who survived?
Answer: all of the couples - Three men were in a boat. It capsized, but only two got their hair wet. Why?
Answer: one was bald - What goes up a chimney down, but won't come down a chimney up?
Answer: an umbrella - What gets bigger the more you take away?
Answer: a hole - I am an odd number. Take away a letter and I become even. What number am I?
Answer: seven - What has one head, one foot and four legs?
Answer: a bed - Everyone has it and no one can lose it; what is it?
Answer: a shadow - What goes up but never comes back down?
Answer: your age - What begins with an E but only has one letter in it?
Answer: an envelope - What begins with T, finishes with T, and has “T” in it?
Answer: a teapot - Which weighs more: a kilogram of feathers or a kilogram of bricks?
Answer: they weigh the same - What is full of holes but still holds water?
Answer: a sponge - Who can shave 25 times a day but still have a beard?
Answer: a barber - What has a bed but never sleeps, can run but never walks and has a bank but no money?
Answer: a river - The more you take the more you leave behind. What are they?
Answer: footsteps - What has four wheels and flies?
Answer: a garbage truck - What has 88 keys, but cannot open a single door?
Answer: a piano - Mary has four daughters and each of her daughters has a brother - how many children does Mary have?
Answer: five - each daughter has the same single brother - I have no life, but I can die. What am I?
Answer: a battery - What gets wetter as it dries?
Answer: a towel - You walk into a dark room containing a match, a gas lamp, a candle and a fireplace. Which would you light first?
Answer: the match - Which word is spelt wrong in every dictionary?
Answer: wrong - How many months have 28 days?
Answer: all of them - What has a face and two hands but no arms or legs?
Answer: a clock - What has a bottom at the top?
Answer: your legs - Which five letter word becomes shorter when you add two letters to it?
Answer: short (short+er) - There is a rooster sitting on top of a barn. If it laid an egg, which way would it roll?
Answer: roosters don’t lay eggs - Where can you find cities, towns, shops and streets but no people?
Answer: a map - I’m tall when I’m young and I’m short when I’m old. What am I?
Answer: a candle - How do you get two whales ('to Wales') in a mini?
Answer: straight along the M4
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