If the sun covers 360 degrees in 24 hours, how many degrees does the sun cover in 1 hour?

Question

I do not know what kind of source you get the answer from. Neither the question.

Answer 1

360 degrees / 24 hours               divide numerator and denominator by 12

30 degrees / 2 hours                   divide numerator and denominator by 2

15 degrees / 1 hour

Answer 2

Percy, you have correctly selected "mental computation" for this problem.  The are many, many practical problems like this that math courses often fail to help us understand because there is an assumption that students know how to use units of measure.

 

Let me illustrate, then I'll solve this problem.  If a problem said, "From a point on the surface of the Earth, approximately now many degrees does Sun appear to travel during a week?"  We would take:

   (7 days)*(360 degrees / day)         [note that days cancel out, leaving degrees]

      [also note:  this is not exact because adjustments are made

              (e.g., leap year) and because the Earth revolves around the Sun]

 

Well, in this problem, the Sun appears to travel:

                        (360 degrees / 1 day)*(1 day / 24 hours)

                      = (360 degrees) / (24 hours)        [notice how the days cancel out; but, keep going]

                       = (15 degrees) / (1 hour)            (just divide 360/24)

 

This can be written as:    15 degrees per hour      or   15 degrees/hour