Question: Karen is planning writing assignments for her fifth grade class. She knows each short-answer question takes 3 minutes to answer, each paragraph takes 15 minutes to write, and each essay takes an hour to write. If Karen assigns 2 essays and 5 paragraphs, how many short-answer questions should she assign if she wants to assign 4 hours of homework total?
Answer: First figure out how many minutes 4 hours is: 4 hours * 60 minutes / hour = 240 minutes. Then figure out how long the two essays will take by multiplying the time per essay by the number of essays: 2 essays * 1 hour / essay * 60 minutes / hour = 120 minutes. Use the same method to find the total time spent writing paragraphs: 15 minutes / paragraph * 5 paragraphs = 75 minutes. Now subtract the time spent on essays and paragraphs from the total time to find the time spent on all the short answer questions: 240 minutes - 120 minutes - 75 minutes = 45 minutes. Finally, divide the total time spent on short - answer questions by the time per question to find the number of questions: 45 minutes / 3 minutes / question = 15 questions. The answer is 15.

Question: Melissa works on a poultry farm. She drives to town twice each month to buy supplies. If it takes her 3 hours to drive to town and back, how many hours does Melissa spend driving in a year?
Answer: Melissa spends 2x3 = 6 hours driving each month. Since there are 12 months in a year, she spends 6x12 = 72 hours driving each year. The answer is 72.

Question: The distance between Robin's house and the city center is 500 meters. He leaves the house to go to the city center. After he walks 200 meters he realizes that he forgot his bag. So he returns to his house, then goes back to the city center. How many meters does he walk in total?
Answer: He walks 200 meters first then he returns to the house. So it makes 200 m + 200 m = 400 m. The city center is 500 meters away from his house so the total distance is 400 m + 500 m = 900 m. The answer is 900.

Question: Jackson wants to impress his girlfriend by filling her hot tub with champagne. The hot tub holds 40 gallons of liquid. Each bottle of champagne holds 1 quart. (There are 4 quarts per gallon). If each bottle of champagne costs $50, but Jackson gets a 20% volume discount, how much does he spend on champagne?
Answer:
First find the number of quarts the hot tub holds by multiplying the number of gallons it holds by 4: 40 gallons * 4 quarts / gallon = 160 quarts. Then multiply the number of quarts of champagne Jackson buy by the normal price per bottle to find the cost before the discount: 160 quarts * $50 / quart = $8000. Then multiply that number by 20% to find the amount of the discount: $8000 * .2 = $1600. Finally, subtract the discount from the total cost to find the final amount Jackson pays: $8000 - $1600 = $6400. The answer is 6400.