Riddles...

As a TTOC you want to have a "Bag of Tricks" and riddles are certainly one way to fill time, stand out, entertain, get students thinking and help with transitions.... 

5 minute mysteries are also fun and work a bit better with older students.

Riddles (Answers are at the bottom of the page)
From a Packet for Substitute Teachers

1. What goes up and down stairs without moving?
2. Give it food and it will live; give it water and it will die.
3. What can you catch but not throw?
4. I run, yet I have no legs. What am I?
5. Take one out and scratch my head, I am now black but once was red.
6. Remove the outside, cook the inside, eat the outside, throw away the inside.
7. What goes around the world and stays in a corner?
8. What gets wetter the more it dries?
9. The more there is, the less you see.
10. They come at night without being called and are lost in the day without being stolen.
11. What kind of room has no windows or doors?
12. I have holes on the top and bottom. I have holes on my left and on my right. And I have holes in the middle, yet I still hold water. What am I?
13. I look at you, you look at me, I raise my right, you raise your left. What is this object?
14. It has no top or bottom but it can hold flesh, bones, and blood all at the same time. What is this object?
15. The more you take the more you leave behind.
16. Light as a feather, there is nothing in it; the strongest man can't hold it for much more than a minute.
17. As I walked along the path I saw something with four fingers and one thumb, but it was not flesh, fish, bone, or fowl.
18. What can run but never walks, has a mouth but never talks, has a head but never weeps, has a bed but never sleeps?
19. I went into the woods and got it, I sat down to seek it, I brought it home with me because I couldn't find it.
20. What can fill a room but takes up no space?
21. It is weightless, you can see it, and if you put it in a barrel it will make the barrel lighter?
22. No sooner spoken than broken. What is it?
23. Only two backbones and thousands of ribs.
24. Four jolly men sat down to play, And played all night till the break of day. They played for cash and not for fun, With a separate score for every one. When it came time to square accounts, They all had made quite fair amounts. Now, not one has lost and all have gained, Tell me, now, this can you explain?
25. Jack and Jill are lying on the floor inside the house, dead. They died from lack of water. There is shattered glass next to them. How did they die?
26. Why don't lobsters share?
27. A barrel of water weighs 20 pounds. What must you add to it to make it weigh 12 pounds?
28. Big as a biscuit, deep as a cup, Even a river can't fill it up. What is it?
29. Clara Clatter was born on December 27^th, yet her birthday is always in the summer. How is this possible?
30. He has married many women but has never married. Who is he?
31. If a rooster laid a brown egg and a white egg, what kind of chicks would hatch?
32. If you have it, you want to share it. If you share it, you don't have it. What is it?
33. You can't keep this until you have given it.
34. Take off my skin, I won't cry, but you will. What am I?
35. What book was once owned by only the wealthy, but now everyone can have it? You can't buy it in a bookstore or take it from the library.
36. What can go up and come down without moving?
37. What do you fill with empty hands?
38. What do you serve that you can't eat?
39. What do you throw out when you want to use it but take in when you don't want to use it?
40. What goes up and never comes down?
41. What has a foot on each side and one in the middle?
42. What has to be broken before it can be used?
43. What kind of coat can be put on only when wet?
44. What question can you never answer "yes" to?
45. What's the greatest worldwide use of cowhide?
46. Which is correct to say, "The yolk of the egg are white?" or "The yolk of the egg is white?"
47. You answer me, although I never ask you questions. What am I?
    
    

Answers

1. Carpet
2. Fire
3. A cold
4. A nose
5. A match
6. Corn
7. A stamp
8. Towel
9. Darkness
10. Stars
11. A mushroom
12. A sponge
13. A mirror
14. A ring
15. Footsteps
16. Breath
17. Glove
18. River
19. Splinter
20. Light
21. A hole
22. Silence
23. Railroad
24. Four men in a dance band
25. Jack and Jill are goldfish.
26. They're shellfish.
27. Holes
28. A kitchen strainer
29. She lives in the Southern Hemisphere.
30. A priest
31. None. Roosters don't lay eggs.
32. A secret
33. A promise
34. An onion
35. A telephone book
36. The temperature
37. Gloves
38. A tennis ball
39. An anchor
40. Your age
41. A yardstick
42. An egg
43. A coat of paint
44. "Are you asleep?"
45. To hold cows together
46. Neither, the yolks are yellow.
47. A telephone