Make 24

This is a speed game that can be played with 2 or 4 players (or by yourself to practise). All you need is a deck of cards!

Instructions:

1. Remove the Jacks, Queens and Kings and the Jokers from your deck of cards.
2. Shuffle the cards and deal them, face down, in piles in front of your players.
3. With two players - both players count down "3, 2, 1, turn!" and turn over their two top cards into the middle. With 4 players - everyone counts down "3, 2, 1, turn!" and turn over their top card into the middle.
4. Each player silently attempts to use the all of the numbers (Aces count as 1), and as many operations $+$, $-$, $\times$, $\div$ and brackets as necessary to try to make 24. (Only the numbers as they're presented are allowed - you're not allowed to take 2 and 4 and claim it's "24"!)
5. The first player to make 24 puts their hand down on the cards (like in "Snap!"), and tells the other(s) how they did it. If the method was valid, they take all the cards and put them, face down, in the bottom of their pile.
6. If their method was wrong, the round carries on until either someone else successfully snaps the cards, or everyone agrees they can't do it. In the second case, everyone takes back the number of cards they put in and places them in the bottom of their piles.

The game ends when one player runs out of cards - then the player with the most cards wins!

Watch out - as your friends and family get quicker at mental arithmetic, this game can get very, very fast!

To practise by yourself, simply draw 4 cards at a time to try and make 24.

Why not arrange a tournament in your class?