Of the 304 people who attended the school play, 5/8 were students. How many of the people who attended were students?

Question

304 people attended a play 5/8 were students. How many people attended were students.

Answer 1

Hi Cynthia!  One way to approach this problem is to take your total and split it into eight parts, then realize that five of those eight parts are students.  So your math would look something like this:

 

304/8 parts = 38 people

 

If 5 of those parts are students, then 38*5 = 190 students.

 

Alternatively, you can "cross multiply and divide"!  That means you would set up a proportionality: 5/8 = x/304 (try writing this on paper to make the fractions easier to see).  "Cross multiplying" just means that you multiply what is across diagonally, so multiply 5*304, and then divide by your "leftover" 8 to get x.  

 

I hope that helps!

Answer 2

five eighths of 304 ("OF" means multiply) comes out to exactly 190.