Building Thinking Skills Book 3 - Figural
Strengthen spatial reasoning with figural puzzles that build real brainpower.
$32.99
Quantity:
Complete Course
Consumable
In a Curriculum Kit
Nonreligious
2026 Eighth-Grade Curriculum Kit
Building Thinking Skills Book 3 - Figural
Some students think best with words. Others can look at a diagram, pattern, or shape and immediately start seeing possibilities. Building Thinking Skills Book 3 – Figural develops the visual side of reasoning through a challenging collection of spatial and analytical puzzles.
Designed for grades 7–12, this 288-page workbook focuses exclusively on figural reasoning. Students analyze patterns, complete analogies, classify figures, solve sequences, and mentally manipulate shapes through increasingly sophisticated visual challenges. Along the way, they strengthen the ability to recognize relationships, organize information, and think through complex problems.
One of the unique strengths of the figural format is that it develops reasoning skills without relying heavily on language. Students learn to rotate, fold, compare, and transform two-dimensional figures while building the visual-spatial abilities used in mathematics, science, engineering, technology, and many skilled trades.
The activities are carefully sequenced, allowing students to build confidence as the challenges become more demanding. What begins as pattern recognition gradually develops into advanced visual analysis, requiring careful observation, strategic thinking, and persistence.
Many students who are less enthusiastic about traditional workbook assignments find themselves surprisingly engaged by these visual puzzles. The challenges feel more like solving mysteries than completing schoolwork, yet they develop the same critical-thinking habits needed for academic success.
Research on the Building Thinking Skills series has shown measurable gains in academic performance, and the program has earned recognition from educators, homeschoolers, and organizations such as Mensa.
Often counted as a half credit at the high school level, Building Thinking Skills Book 3 – Figural provides a rigorous workout for the visual reasoning skills that support success both in the classroom and beyond.
How to Use Building Thinking Skills Book 3 – Figural
- Plan on completing about 8 pages each week. At that pace, your student can comfortably finish the book within a school year while still having time to think through the more challenging exercises.
- Encourage your teen to work independently whenever possible. Many of the activities require careful observation, visual analysis, and persistence, so giving him time to wrestle with a problem often leads to deeper learning than providing immediate help.
- Unlike traditional logic courses, Book 3 – Figural relies heavily on visual reasoning. Students will spend time analyzing patterns, comparing figures, completing sequences, and mentally manipulating shapes. Some challenges may feel difficult at first, but that's part of the growth process.
- When your student gets stuck, encourage him to explain what he already knows before looking for the answer. Talking through possibilities often reveals clues that were overlooked on the first pass.
- The perforated pages make it easy to assign work in batches of a few pages at a time, keeping the course manageable and helping students focus on quality thinking rather than simply finishing pages.
By the end of the book, your teen will have completed hundreds of visual reasoning challenges while strengthening the analytical and spatial-thinking skills that support success in mathematics, science, technology, engineering, and many real-world problem-solving situations.
In the 2026 kits this course earns high school credit:
0.5 credits of Logic & Critical Thinking
Thinking Skills · 8th grade · Classic and Non-Religious kits
High-school level work in a middle school kit.
Answers are located in the back of this book.
Publisher's Information
Publisher: The Critical Thinking Co™
Authors: Sandra Parks & Howard Black
Age Recommendation:
Grade Recommendation:
Faith-Based: No
Consumable: Yes (can be reproduced in your own home or classroom, but not for any commercial entity or organization)
Pages:
Activities:
ISBN:
Format: Softcover
Copyright: 2007
Made in: USA
Awards and Endorsements from:
- The National Parenting Center Seal of Approval
- Mom's Choice Awards Gold Medal for Excellence
- Parent Tested, Parent Approved Winner's Seal
- Mensa Recommended Materials for the Gifted
- iParenting Media Award
- Parent Tested, Parent Approved (PTPA) Seal of Approval
- Cathy Duffy 101 Top Picks for Homeschool Curriculum
- Dr. Toy 10 Best Software
- Creative Child Magazine Seal of Excellence Award
- Learning® Magazine Teacher's Choice Award
- iParenting Media Excellent Products
- Cathy Duffy Top 100 Award
- Dr. Toy 100 Best Children's Products
- Learning® Magazine Recommended Resource for Successful Teaching
- The Well-Trained Mind Recommended Resource for Logic and Critical Thinking
- Practical Homeschooling Reader Awards™ - 3rd Place, Logic Category
- Practical Homeschooling Magazine 2nd Place Reader Award
- The Old Schoolhouse Magazine 1st Place Excellence in Education Award
review by the Flanders Family
”I can’t help but think all that practice on figural problems helped when it came time for our two dentists to take their DATs! The exercises in the verbal volume of Book 3 are great prep for the SAT, as well.”
Read the ReviewFind answers to the most frequently asked questions about this product below:
Building Thinking Skills Book 3 - Figural counts as half a credit of Logic & Critical Thinking on a high school transcript. To turn its grade into a GPA, use our free homeschool GPA calculator: it works out each letter grade from your student's scores, figures the GPA by year and for all of high school, and prints a grade record for the transcript.
Customers earn Doodle Dollars for reviewing products they've purchased, and some promotions add an entry in a prize drawing. Rewards never depend on the rating given.
- January 17, 2026
Monica M.
Awesome book when your kids need a “brain break” and do some fun work that’s still critical thinking!
- March 4, 2025
Quick and Enjoyable Pages
A. P.
My boys have completed almost all of the Building Thinking Skills books. This one follows the same pattern and it's quick and easy. It really stretches their brains and mine sometimes.
- June 26, 2024
Great book
Heather J.
This book really got my child to think and we both enjoyed it.
- June 8, 2022
Needed this
STACEY B.
Added to our curriculum
- April 2, 2021
Kristi D.
Perfect for my ADHD eighth grader to start the day.
- November 19, 2020
Love this book.
Amanda L.
My daughter needs extra support in organizing her thoughts. This helped to slow down her thought processes and organize them.
- October 17, 2020
My Daughter Loves This Book!
Katy M.
The Building Thinking Skills Book 3 Figural has become my 8th grade daughter's favorite book to work on this year. She finds a lot of the puzzles and shapes challenging but loves working to figure them out. I love that it's getting her to really think outside of the box.
- October 10, 2020
Louise O.
This has been a great book for my son to work on his visual perception skills. So far he seems to enjoy it and does fairly well at the different activities.
- March 15, 2019
Building Thinking Skills Book 3 Figural
Rachel W.
My kids have used all of the Building Thinking Skills books and I think it really helps them think outside of the box. It was a little tough when they were younger, but I've noticed that it's helped them build on the previous books they've done.
- January 30, 2017
Building Thinking Skills
Eric, a.
This is one of my favorite things to do each day. It doesn't really feel like I'm doing school work at all when I do the Thinking Skills. It's really fun actually. I like to draw so a lot of what I do in this workbook is like art & design so maybe that's why I like it so much. I also really like measurements, since my dad works in construction & I help him every summer, so doing these lessons is kind of like what we do when we are measuring & building. I really like it!
