Word Problem Thursday: Crayons

Sep 14, 2017 | Naperville

“Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty.” -Bertrand Russell

Forgive us for WAXing poetic, we just want to DRAW you in and pique your interest in this week’s math challenge! We know you’re going to love working out this COLORFUL word problem. Give it a try and check below when you're ready for the solution.

Challenge: Nora makes 90 homemade crayons. A small box can hold 8 crayons, and a large box can hold 24 crayons. If she fills 4 small boxes with crayons, how many large boxes will she need for the rest of the crayons?

 

 

 

 

Solution: Four small boxes hold 8 × 4 = 32 crayons, leaving 90 – 32 = 58 crayons unboxed. So, Nora can put 48 into 2 large boxes and the rest into a 3rd large box.

(Image above by Chris Metcalf, from Wikimedia Commons.)