Ok since everyone's struggling with the puzzles for some reason I'm going to take a second to make it as easy as I feasibly can and hopefully people come across this: All you have to do to consistently solve these puzzles in a reasonable time is to treat it like a game of snake. Those old flash games where you're a snake and you keep getting longer. You can start solving any side of the puzzle first, but the left and top make the most sense. I usually start from top to bottom. It doesn't make sense to start from the bottom or right since in this puzzle, those sides have a missing piece, and technically that hole is what you're using to solve the puzzle.
From the top: Identify what pieces you need. In the Marie picture in the break room, you can easily identify which pieces are the top of her head. There's a left top piece, a middle of her hair top piece, and a top right piece. Once you know where those pieces are, you are going to move them into place from beginning to end like a 3 square long "snake." And what matters is you put them in the ORDER the snake is going to "move." I usually make the top right piece the "head" of the snake and just move the other pieces along behind it. In other words, there's the empty slot ahead of the head, you move the head into that spot, then you move the middle piece behind that, and the tail behind that, and now that you've moved the snake forward, it doesn't matter what pieces you mess with behind it, so long as you create a gap in front of the "head" again, then move the whole snake forward again. Keeping in mind that if you want to start with the top right piece as the head, you need to make sure it goes from the middle left, to the top left, to the top middle, to the top right, and that the other pieces follow its path and then end up in the right spot. Once you have the top row in, you can simply repeat this for the middle row, and usually because of the way these puzzles work, the last row will go into place by itself.
If you're having trouble building the "snake" in the first place because you can't maneuver the pieces, simply identify the "head" piece that goes in front, imagine an invisible square made out of 4 squares right next to it, insert the middle piece into that 4 square box, and rotate the box until that middle piece is next to the head. Now without moving the head or the middle piece, maneuver the other pieces so that the empty slot is in front of the head, move the head into that space, move the middle into the space where the head WAS, and now you can repeat the process you just did except with the middle where the head was, and now you're adding the tail into that 4 piece square, and shuffle it into place behind the middle piece.
This may seem like a lot, but I can promise you it's only a lot because I tried to type it so descriptively that an elementary schooler could understand it. Once you get the hang of it, it makes these puzzles very simple and you don't even have to do all this thinking. You just know what to do. The puzzle is not hard, what makes it hard is that everyone just keeps guessing instead of thinking up a logical way to go about solving it. If you played a sport for the first time, and kept trying to win without learning how the game works or practicing, you can see how that would be ridiculous. You have to have an idea of what you're doing, and it's now simpler.
From the top: Identify what pieces you need. In the Marie picture in the break room, you can easily identify which pieces are the top of her head. There's a left top piece, a middle of her hair top piece, and a top right piece. Once you know where those pieces are, you are going to move them into place from beginning to end like a 3 square long "snake." And what matters is you put them in the ORDER the snake is going to "move." I usually make the top right piece the "head" of the snake and just move the other pieces along behind it. In other words, there's the empty slot ahead of the head, you move the head into that spot, then you move the middle piece behind that, and the tail behind that, and now that you've moved the snake forward, it doesn't matter what pieces you mess with behind it, so long as you create a gap in front of the "head" again, then move the whole snake forward again. Keeping in mind that if you want to start with the top right piece as the head, you need to make sure it goes from the middle left, to the top left, to the top middle, to the top right, and that the other pieces follow its path and then end up in the right spot. Once you have the top row in, you can simply repeat this for the middle row, and usually because of the way these puzzles work, the last row will go into place by itself.
If you're having trouble building the "snake" in the first place because you can't maneuver the pieces, simply identify the "head" piece that goes in front, imagine an invisible square made out of 4 squares right next to it, insert the middle piece into that 4 square box, and rotate the box until that middle piece is next to the head. Now without moving the head or the middle piece, maneuver the other pieces so that the empty slot is in front of the head, move the head into that space, move the middle into the space where the head WAS, and now you can repeat the process you just did except with the middle where the head was, and now you're adding the tail into that 4 piece square, and shuffle it into place behind the middle piece.
This may seem like a lot, but I can promise you it's only a lot because I tried to type it so descriptively that an elementary schooler could understand it. Once you get the hang of it, it makes these puzzles very simple and you don't even have to do all this thinking. You just know what to do. The puzzle is not hard, what makes it hard is that everyone just keeps guessing instead of thinking up a logical way to go about solving it. If you played a sport for the first time, and kept trying to win without learning how the game works or practicing, you can see how that would be ridiculous. You have to have an idea of what you're doing, and it's now simpler.
