Question

Fred can drink `8 3/4` sodas in 5 minutes. At this rate, how many sodas can Fred drink in 2 minutes?

Answer 1

`3 1/2` sodas

Explanation:

You know how much he can drink in 5 minutes, and you want to know how much he can drink in 2. So if you work out how much he drinks in 1 minute, then you multiply it by 2 to get your answer.

`8 3/4 -: 5`
`=35/4 -: 5/1`
`=35/4 * 1/5`

to multiply fractions: top-times-top, bottom-times-bottom:

`=35/20` or `1 15/20 = 1 3/4` in 1 minute.

Now multiply by 2 and you know how much he can drink in two minutes!

`1 3/4 times 2 = 7/4*2/1 = 14/4 = 3 1/2`

Answer 2

Fred can drink 1 and a half cans of soda in `2` minutes.

Explanation:

We can just cross-multiply for the entirety of this problem.

First off, I'm going to turn the fraction into an improper fraction.

`8\3/4 = 35/4`

I'm also going to convert the time from minutes to seconds.

`(1 "minute") /(60 "seconds") = (5 "minutes")/x`

`300=x`

There are `300` seconds in `5` minutes. As for 2 minutes, if we do the same, we get `120` seconds.

Now the actual problem.

`(35/4)/300=x/120`

`1050=300x`

`1050/300= (300x)/300`

`3.5=x`

`7/2=x`

`1\1/2=x`

Therefore, Fred can drink 1 and a half cans of soda in `2` minutes.

Hope this helps :)