Question

The morning announcements said that two out of every seven sixth-grade students in the school have an overdue library book. Jasmine said, "That would mean 24 of us have overdue books!" Grace argued, "No way. That is way too high." How can you determine who is right?

Answer 1

Answer:

We need to know how many students are in sixth grade and compare the real number with the 84 sixth graders that Jasmine claims to be.

Step-by-step explanation:

We would need to know how many students are in sixth grade to determine who is right. If two students out of seven have an overdue library book and grace claims that 24 of them are overdue by that means, what we would need to do is divide the allegedly 24 students between 2. Now we have 12 pairs of students that have overdue books. For every pair of students in sixth grade that have overdue books, seven students don’t have overdue books, so now we multiply 12 pairs of students with overdue books times 7 students who don’t have overdue books. By Jasmine calculation then, sixth grade have 84 students.  

If sixth grade have indeed 84 students, Jasmine is right. If there are not 84 students in sixth grade, she is wrong. Grace is right if there are fewer students than 84 in sixth grade.

Have a nice day! :D