Lower Elementary:
Question: Thomas earned twice as much money as Quinn. Quinn earned twice as much money as Jerry. If Jerry earned $8, how much money did Thomas earn?
Answer: $32
Solution: To find how much Thomas has earned, we first need to find how much Quinn has earned. Quinn earned twice as much as Jerry and Jerry earned $8. 8 doubled is 16, so Quinn earned $16. Thomas earned twice as much as Quinn. 16 doubled = 10 doubled + 6 doubled = 20 + 12 = 32. Thomas earned $32.
Upper Elementary:
Question: In one hour, Hilary prepared and ate her lunch. She spent half of the time preparing her ingredients, three tenths of the time cooking, and the rest of the time eating. How much time in minutes does Hilary spend eating?
Answer: 12 minutes
Solution: One way to solve this problem is to find the amount of time Hilary spent for preparing and cooking the food and then subtracting those times from 1 hour, which is 60 minutes. Half of 60 is 30, so she spent 30 minutes preparing food. One tenth of 60 is 6, so three tenths of 60 is 6 × 3 = 18, so she spend 18 minutes cooking her food. 60 – 30 – 18 = 12, so Hilary spent 12 minutes eating her food.
Middle School:
Question: If a cube has a volume of 1 cubic foot, what is the volume of the cube in inches?
Answer: 1,728 cubic inches
Solution: The formula for the volume of a cube is the side length raised to the third power. If the volume is 1 cubic foot and since 1 × 1 × 1 = 1, then the side lengths are 1 foot. There are 12 inches in 1 foot, so the side lengths of the cube are 12 inches. So, the volume of the cube is 12 × 12 × 12 = 144 × 12 = 1,728 cubic inches.
Algebra and Up:
Question: A car is moving at a speed of 60 miles per hour. What is the car’s speed in meters per second? (hint: 1 mile is approximately 1,609 meters)
Answer: 26.82 meters per second
Solution: To solve this problem, we need to convert the miles to meters and then convert the 1 hour into seconds. 1 mile is approximately 1,609 meters, so 60 miles is 60 • 1,609 = 96,540 meters. In 1 hour, there are 60 minutes. In 1 minute there are 60 seconds, so in 60 minutes there are 60 • 60 = 3,600 seconds. So, 60 miles per hour is the same as 96,540 meters per 3,600 seconds. Divide the values to find the speed per one second. 96,540 / 3,600 is approximately 26.82 meters per second.
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