Question

The label on a soft drink bottle gives the volume in two units: 2.0 L and 67.6 fl oz. Use this information to derive a conversion factor between the English and metric units.

Answer 1

Answer:

Let's look at another example: 3/4 is the same as 6/8. How do you know this to be true? The proof is in the pie chart diagram. The top circle has 3 out of the 4 parts shaded in. The bottom circle has 6 of the 8 parts shaded in. However, both fractions refer to the same part of the circle.

You can check your results by dividing. Here, both the numerator (6) and the denominator (8) are divisible by 2.

Finding 2nd Fraction Numerators

What would happen if a numerator were missing? Well, if you're given two fractions and told that they are equivalent fractions, you can find the missing numerator using multiplication or division.

In all equivalent fractions, both the numerator and denominator of the first fraction can be multiplied by the same number to get the numerator and denominator of the second fraction.

Say one of the numerators was missing from those pie chart equations:

3 / 4 = x / 8

You can see that there is an x alongside one of the numerators. That represents the number you are trying to find.

The answer lies in discovering what the first denominator can be multiplied by to get the other denominator. You might be good enough at your times tables to know that 4 times 2 is 8. But you can also check this number by dividing the denominator (8) by the denominator (4), which equals 2.