Lower Elementary:
Question: In a bowling game, Renee knocked over 8 pins in the first frame, 7 pins in the second frame, and 5 pins in the third frame. Laurie knocked over 7 pins in the first frame, 3 pins in the second frame, and 9 pins in the third frame. After the third frame, who is in the lead and by how much?
Answer: Renee by 1 point
Solution: Renee’s total score is 8 + 7 + 5. One way to add this is to add the 8 and the 7 first but doing doubles plus 1. 7 doubled is 14, and 8 is one more than 7, so one more than 14 is 15. So, 8 + 7 = 15. 15 + 5 = 20. Renee’s score is 20. Laurie’s total score is 7 + 3 + 9. One way to add this is to add the 7 and the 3 first because they make 10. 7 + 3 = 10. 10 + 9 = 19. Laurie’s score is 19. So, Renee is in the lead by 1 point
Upper Elementary:
Question: Half of the toys in the toy bin are balls, one-fourth of the toys are stuffed animals, and the remaining 6 toys are action figures. How many total toys are in the toy bin?
Answer: 24 toys
Solution: First, we need to find the fractional part of the toys that are action figures. To find the fractional part, take the sum of the other parts and subtract it from the whole. 1/2 + 1/4 = 2/4 + 1/4 = 3/4. Now we subtract this from the whole. 1 – 3/4 = 1/4. So, action figures represent 1/4 of the total toys. That means that 1 out of 4 parts is 6 toys, so 4 out of 4 parts would be 24 toys. So there are 24 toys in the bin.
Middle School:
Question: A restaurant bill came to $50 before sales tax. The sales tax is 9% and the customers decide to tip 20% of the original bill. How much does the total bill come to?
Answer: $64.50
Solution: One way to solve this problem is to find the amount from the sales tax and the amount from the tip and add them to the total. Percent means for each hundred. Since 50 is half of 100, if we find half of the percent, we will find the amount to add. So, 9% of 50 is 4.5. The sales tax came to $4.50. 20% of 50 = 10. The tip came to $10. So, we add $14.50 ($4.50 + $10 = $14.50) to the bill to get $64.50.
Alternatively, we can add the sales tax percent and the tip percent together and find that percent of the bill. 20% + 9% = 29%. 29% of 50 = 14.5. So we add $14.50 to the bill to get a total of $64.50
Algebra and Up:
Question: At one point, a rollercoaster goes 80 miles per hour for 5 seconds. How many miles does it travel in this time frame?
Answer: 1/9 of a mile
Solution: One way to solve this problem is to convert the rate the roller coaster travels in miles per second so that we can see how far it travels in 4 seconds. There are 60 minutes in an hour, so that means 80 miles per hour = 80 miles per 60 minutes = 4 miles per 3 minutes. There are 60 seconds in a minute, which means there are 180 seconds in 3 minutes. So now we have 4 miles per 3 minutes = 4 miles per 180 seconds = 1 mile per 45 seconds = 1/45 a mile per second. Therefore, after 5 seconds, it will have traveled 5/45 = 1/9 of a mile.
(925) 292-8854
