if you have $30 and spend 20% of it on groceries, how much money did you spend on your groceries?

Question

a math word problem that i am stuck on. 

Answer 1

Hello Emma- those previous answers make a simple problem way to confusing- people do these in their head all of the time when out shopping or being offered a sale.

 

1)10% of $30.00 is $3.00 X 2  = $6.00 because .20 x $3.00 = $6.00 , so $6.00 was spent on groceries.

 

Best regards , Laura

Answer 2

In word problems, "of" is a multiplication indicator.  What does the "it" refer to in the problem?  The $30.  In other words, you spend 20% of the $30.  20 percent can be looked at a few different ways.  "percent" literally means "divided by 100," or if you're comfortable with decimals, 20% is just .2

 

So the question is: What is 20% of 30?  Rewriting 20% as 20 divided by 100, and changing "of" to "times," it's really this:

 

(20/100) (30) = ?

 

I'll leave the last step to you.

Answer 3

Hi Emma,

 

It might be helpful to think of the problem in this way:  the figure "20%" is asking for the portion of thirty dollars that goes into 30 the same number of times that 20 goes into 100 (because 100% is the entire 30 dollars, in this case).  

 

If it helps to think of it solely in terms of numbers, think of it this way: the problem wants you to find the value of x so that x/30 = 20/100. That expression is what I described in words above.

 

Because 20 goes into 100 five times, you are looking for the amount of money that goes into 30 five times.  This means that a question asking you to find 20% of a number is the same thing as asking you to divide that number by five.

 

I hope that helps!

 

Best,

Aaron