Senior Abrielle Hayes’s days revolve around one thing: the daily Sudoku puzzle.
“[Sudoku] is my favorite thing ever,” Abrielle said. “I’m obsessed with it. I have to do the daily puzzle every single day. [I use] New York Times, and then, I have an app on my computer. You may find me playing it during class.”
Abrielle’s passion for Sudoku and similar puzzles stemmed from a culmination of boredom, curiosity, and the desire to prove herself wrong after many futile attempts at solving the puzzle.
Abrielle describes Sudoku as a paper or digital game that contains squares in each grid and you have to get the numbers one to nine only once inside each vertical and horizontal line and one in each grid of nine. The process itself is tedious, requiring learned focus and problem-solving skills to place each number in its correct square.
After many years of practicing Sudoku diligently, Abrielle has become hooked on many aspects of the game.
“I think I started when I was seven,” Abrielle said. “My dad tried to show me how to do it, but I thought it was boring and stuff. My sister had a book, and over the summer, she kind of showed me how to [play it] because I was frustrated and couldn’t understand—when I was frustrated, I would just close the book and be done.”
Abrielle plays Sudoku online more than in an actual book of puzzles. She uses the Sudoku app on her computer or will go to sudoku.com to have random puzzles generated to pass boredom or do in her free time. Abrielle claims that she will play Sudoku whenever she has time to kill: in class, at home, or any other time when she is feeling bored.
After a decade of practicing her skill with Sudoku daily, Abrielle has key strategies and approaches when it comes to solving a rather difficult puzzle. Often, she will verbalize her thoughts to try and form connections and generate ideas.
“The hard ones are where they only give you five numbers,” Abrielle said. “It’s like problem-solving where I write it down sometimes—I’ll have a paper and write down like ‘Okay, if there’s everything but an eight or nine here,’ I write down that it could be an eight or nine, and it helps me.”
Once, her friend asked her if there were any benefits associated with playing Sudoku; given that she plays the game daily, Abrielle researched potential benefits that are associated with playing Sudoku. She found that it delays dementia, helps problem-solving skills, and aids in logical thinking, similar to playing an instrument or learning a new language.
By sitting down each day and forcing her brain to concentrate on a single task until it is completed, Abrielle says that she feels like she would be less focused and lack certain problem-solving skills if she didn’t exercise her brain daily with Sudoku.
Because of her daily practices with the game, Abrielle has set her own records when it comes to solving different levels of puzzles, adding a competitive element on top of everything that the game offers.
“Easy [puzzles]—one time I [got] a record. I think [I solved it in] 70 seconds,” Abrielle said. “That was in summer, and I was super bored and tried to break my record. Harder ones still take me a little bit, and I try to do it all in one sitting. Sometimes, I take a break and come back and see something that I didn’t see before.”
In addition to Sudoku, Abrielle will sometimes participate in other online games such as Wordle, Globle, and Heardle. All of these games can help with critical thinking and problem-solving skills, but Globle is an excellent daily game to advance geography skills whereas Heardle strengthens music skills by trying to guess the daily song by listening to it audibly.
Overall, Abrielle’s passion for Sudoku has strengthened many of her cognitive skills by daily playing and filling her free time with this helpful hobby. Abrielle encourages her family members and friends to do the same.
“It also helps dopamine levels because it motivates you,” Abrielle said. “Anything that motivates you can increase your dopamine and give you a sense of satisfaction, so it helps with your mental health as well.”
