Linear Equation

1.Word problems
The difficult part of solving word problems is translating the words into
equations, it's good to work with lots of different problems. I'll work
through a variety of problems below.
Example. 68 less than 5 times a number is equal to the number. Find the number.
Let x be the number. Note that "68 less than 5 times the number" translates to the
expression
, not
. So the problem statement gives

Example. Calvin Butterball buys a book for $14.70, which is a

regular price. What is the regular price of the book?
Let x be the regular price. A
discount is
Set this equal to 14.7 and solve for x:

discount off the

, so the discounted price is

2.digit problems
If the problem involves interchanging of the digits in the integer then
you would need to convert from the digits to numbers and vice versa.
To convert the digits to numbers, we need to multiply with the digit
with the place value of the digit.
For example, the value of the number formed by the digit 4 in the
tens place and the digit 3 in the ones place is 4 10 + 3 1

Example:
The sum of the digits of a two-digit number is 11. If we interchange
the digits then the new number formed is 45 less than the original.
Find the original number.
Solution:
Step 1: Assign variables :
Let

x=

ones digit

t=

tens digit

Sentence: The sum of the digits of a two-digit number is 11.

x + t = 11
Isolate variable x
x = 11 t

(equation 1)

Step 2: Convert digits to number

Original number = t 10 + x
Interchanged number = x 10 + t
Sentence: If we interchange the digits then the new number formed is
45 less than the original.
Interchanged = Original 45
x 10 + t = t 10 + x 45
10x + t = 10t + x 45
10x x + t = 10t 45 (x to both sides)
10x x = 10t t 45 ( t to both sides)
10x x + 45 = 10t t (+ 45 to both sides)
10t t = 10x x + 45 (Rewrite equation with t on the left hand side)

Combine like terms

10t t = 10x x + 45
9t = 9x + 45
(equation 2)
Substitute equation 1 into equation 2
9t = 9(11 t) + 45
9t = 99 9t + 45
Isolate variable t
9t + 9t = 99 + 45
18t = 144

The tens digit is 8. The ones digit is 11 8 = 3

Answer: The number is 83.

3.Investment problems
Investment problems usually involve simple annual interest (as
opposed to compounded interest), using the interest formula I =
Prt, where I stands for the interest on the original
investment, P stands for the amount of the original investment
(called the "principal"), r is the interest rate (expressed in decimal
form), andt is the time.
You put $1000 into an investment yielding 6% annual
interest; you left the money in for two years. How much
interest do you get at the end of those two years?
In this case, P = $1000, r = 0.06 (because I have to convert the
percent to decimal form), and the time is t = 2. Substituting, I get:
I = (1000)(0.06)(2) = 120

I will get $120 in interest.

examples
You put $1000 into an investment yielding 6% annual interest; you left
the money in for two years. How much interest do you get at the end of
those two years?
In this case, P = $1000, r = 0.06 (because I have to convert the
percent to decimal form), and the time is t = 2. Substituting, I get:

I = (1000)(0.06)(2) = 120
I will get

$120 in interest

You invested $500 and received

the interest rate?

$650after three years. What had been

For this exercise, I first need to find the amount of the interest. Since interest is
added to the principal, and since P = $500, then I = $650 500 =
$150. The time is t = 3. Substituting all of these values into the simpleinterest formula, I get:

150 = (500)(r)(3)
150 = 1500r
150
/1500 = r = 0.10

4.Mixture problems
Mixture problems involve creating a mixture from two or more things,
and then determining some quantity (percentage, price, etc) of the
resulting mixture.

Example:

Your school is holding a "family friendly" event this

weekend. Students have been pre-selling tickets to the event; adult
tickets are $5.00, and child tickets (for kids six years old and
under) are$2.50. From past experience, you expect
about13,000 people to attend the event. But this is the first year in
which tickets prices have been reduced for the younger children, so

you really don't know how many child tickets and how many adult
tickets you can expect to sell. Your boss wants you to estimate the
expected ticket revenue. You decide to use the information from
the pre-sold tickets to estimate the ratio of adults to children, and
figure the expected revenue from this information.
You consult with your student ticket-sellers, and discover that they
have not been keeping track of how many child tickets they have
sold. The tickets are identical, until the ticket-seller punches a hole
in the ticket, indicating that it is a child ticket. But they don't
remember how many holes they've punched. They only know that
they've sold 548tickets for $2460. How much revenue from each of
child and adult tickets can you expect?
Let A stand for the number of adult tickets pre-sold, andC stand for
the child tickets pre-sold. Then A + C = 548. Also, since each adult
ticket cost $5.00, then ($5.00)Astands for the revenue brought in
from the adult tickets pre-sold; likewise, ($2.50)C stands for the
revenue brought in from the child tickets. Then the total income so
far is given by ($5.00)A + ($2.50)C = $2460. But we can only solve
an equation with one variable, not two. So look again at that first
equation. If A + C = 548, then A = 548 C (or C = 548 A; it
doesn't matter which variable you solve for). Organizing this
information in a grid, we get:

adult
child
total

tickets sold
548 C
C
548

$/ticket
$5
$2.50
---

total $
$5(548 C)
$2.50C
$2460

From the last column, we get (total $ from the adult tickets) plus
(total $ from the child tickets) is (the total $ so far), or, as an
equation:
($5.00)(548 C) + ($2.50)C = $2460
$2740 ($5.00)C + ($2.50)C = $2460
$2740 ($2.50)C = $2460
($2.50)C = $280
C = $280/$2.50 = 112

Then 112 child tickets were pre-sold, so A = 548 112 = 436 adult
tickets were sold. (Using "A" and "C" for our variables, instead of
"x" and "y", was helpful, because the variables suggested what
they stood for. We knew instantly that "C = 112" meant "112 child
tickets". This is a useful technique.)
Now we need to figure out how many adult and child tickets we can
expect to sell overall. Since 436 out of 548 pre-sold tickets were
adult tickets, then we can expect 436/548, or about 79.6%, of the total
tickets sold to be adult tickets. Since we expect
about 13,000 people, this works out to about 10,343adult tickets.
(You can find this value by using proportions, by the way.) The
remaining 2657 tickets will be child tickets. Then the expected total
ticket revenue totals to $58,357.50, of which ($5.00)(10,343)
= $51,715 will come from adult tickets, and ($2.50)(2,657)
= $6,642.50 will come from child tickets.

Example:

Another one. This time, suppose you work in a lab.

You need a 15% acid solution for a certain test, but your supplier
only ships a10% solution and a 30% solution. Rather than pay the
hefty surcharge to have the supplier make a 15% solution, you
decide to mix 10%solution with 30% solution, to make your
own15% solution. You need 10 liters of the 15%acid solution. How
many liters of 10% solution and 30% solution should you use?
Let x stand for the number of liters of 10%solution, and let y stand
for the number of liters of 30% solution. (The labeling of variables
is, in this case, very important, because "x" and "y" are not at all
suggestive of what they stand for. If we don't label, we won't be
able to interpret our answer in the end.) For mixture problems, it is
often very helpful to do a grid:
liters
sol'n
10% sol'n
x
30% sol'n
y
mixture x + y =
10

percent
acid
0.10
0.30
0.15

total liters
acid
0.10x
0.30y
(0.15)(10) =
1.5

Since x + y = 10, then x = 10 y. Using this, we can substitute

for x in our grid, and eliminate one of the variables: Copyright
Elizabeth Stapel 1999-2011 All Rights Reserved
liters sol'n percent
liters acid
acid
10% sol'n 10 y
0.10
0.10(10 y)
30% sol'n
y
0.30
0.30y
mixture x + y =
0.15
(0.15)(10) =
10
1.5
When the problem is set up like this, you can usually use the last
column to write your equation: The liters of acid from
the 10% solution, plus the liters of acid in the 30% solution, add up
to the liters of acid in the 15% solution. Then:
0.10(10 y) + 0.30y = 1.5
1 0.10y + 0.30y = 1.5
1 + 0.20y = 1.5
0.20y = 0.5
y = 0.5/0.20 = 2.5
Then we need 2.5 liters of the 30% solution, and x = 10 y = 10
2.5 = 7.5 liters of the 10%solution. (If you think about it, this makes
sense. Fifteen percent is closer to 10% than to 30%, so we ought to
need more 10% solution in our mix.)

5. Age problems
In three more years, Miguel's grandfather will be six
times as old as Miguel was last year. When Miguel's
present age is added to his grandfather's present age,
the total is 68. How old is each one now?
This exercise refers not only to their present ages, but also to
both their ages last year and their ages in three years, so
labelling will be very important. I will label Miguel's present age
as "m" and his grandfather's present age as "g". Then m + g =

68. Miguel's age "last year" was m 1. His grandfather's age "in
three more years" will be g + 3. The grandfather's "age three
years from now" is six times Miguel's "age last year" or, in math:
g + 3 = 6(m 1)
This gives me two equations with two variables:
m + g = 68
g + 3 = 6(m 1)
Solving the first equation, I get m = 68 g. (Note: It's okay to
solve for "g = 68 m", too. The problem will work out a bit
differently in the middle, but the answer will be the same at the
end.) I'll plug "68 g" into the second equation in place of "m":
g + 3 = 6m 6
g + 3 = 6(68 g) 6
g + 3 = 408 6g 6
g + 3 = 402 6g
g + 6g = 402 3
7g = 399
g = 57
Since "g" stands for the grandfather's current age, then the
grandfather is 57 years old. Sincem + g = 68, then m = 11,
and Miguel is presently eleven years old.
One-half of Heather's age two years from now plus onethird of her age three years ago is twenty years. How old
is she now?
This problem refers to Heather's age two years in the future and
three years in the past. So I'll pick a variable and label
everything clearly:
age now: H
age two years from now: H + 2
age three years ago: H 3
Now I need certain fractions of these ages:

one-half of age two years from now: ( 1/2 )(H + 2) = H/2 + 1

one-third of age three years ago: ( 1/3 )(H 3) = H/3 1
The sum of these two numbers is twenty, so I'll add them and
set this equal to 20:
H

/2 + 1 + H/3 1 = 20
H
/2 + H/3 = 20
3H + 2H = 120
5H = 120
H = 24
Heather is 24 years old.

Done by: waha

Agalin
Submitted to:
teacher Desiree