Trey and Mina were bored. They were waiting for their mom to finish shopping. “Hey!” said Trey. “I have paper and pencil in my pocket. Let’s play tic-tac-toe.”

Trey and Mina loved tic-tac-toe. They played whenever they had a few extra minutes. They liked to play on paper menus at restaurants while they were waiting for their food. Trey was always X. Mina was always O.

Trey drew the grid on his paper. “Did you know that tic-tac-toe has different names in other countries?” he asked. “In England it’s called noughts and crosses. In Canada it’s called Xs and Os.”

“Those names make more sense than ours,” Mina laughed. “But did you know people played a game like tic-tac-toe in ancient Egypt?  Someone found a board on an old roof rile from 1300 BC.”

“Wow, that’s pretty cool,” said Trey. “I heard that they played tic-tac-toe in ancient Rome too. It was a little different from our game. They used stones instead of drawing Xs and Os. Each player only got three stones. So they had to move them around to the empty spaces.”

“That’s neat,” said Mina. “At school I learned that  tic-tac-toe is also related to a game called picaria. Picaria was played by Native Americans in the southwest.”

“A lot of people like tic-tac-toe!” said Trey.

“Just like us!” said Mina.