Liam has 8 3/4 gallons of paint. He wants to use 2/5 of the paint to paint his living room. How many gallons of paint will Liam use?
Multiply 8 3/4 x 2/5=70/20
70/20=3.5
Answer: Liam will use 3.5 gallons of paint
Is this correct?
Wow I did not feel I would be able to get the right answer. I am literally terrible at math and word problems. What is the best way to know in a word problem when you have to do multiplication or division or subtraction or addition? Please help me to understand.
correct
it said "to use 2/5 of the paint"
the English word "of" usually indicates that you would be multiplying.
eg. give me 1/2 of $6.00
so
(1/2)(6.00) = $3.00
Very often, creating a simpler problem with easy numbers let's you get the answer by simple common sense.
Then ask yourself, "what operation did I use to get that common sense answer"
e.g. Bill has 20 cents more than Mary.
If Bill has 60 cents, then Mary must have 40 cents. (common sense answer)
What did I do to get 40 ?
60 - 20 = 40
So "of" indicates multiply
What would indicate division in a word problem?
Yes, your calculation is correct. To find out how many gallons of paint Liam will use, you need to multiply the whole number portion (8) by the denominator of the fraction (4), then add the numerator (3) to get a total of 35/4. This gives you the mixed number 8 3/4.
Next, you multiply 8 3/4 by 2/5. To do this, you can convert the mixed number 8 3/4 into an improper fraction, which is (8 * 4 + 3)/4, or 35/4.
To multiply fractions, you multiply the numerators (8 * 35) to get the new numerator (280), and multiply the denominators (4 * 5) to get the new denominator (20). So, the fraction becomes 280/20.
Simplifying the fraction by dividing the numerator and denominator by their greatest common divisor (which is 20 in this case), you get 14/1.
Therefore, Liam will use 14 gallons of paint.