Thomas R. answered • 05/27/18
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Over 25 years of experience and a sense of humor about math
Carol has already given the answer, but i like to encourage students to function without calculators, so here is how she got it:
First, you need to set up the problem (it's slightly awkward in this text editor, but I will try to clean it up). First, you place the divisor, r, on the outside and your dividend, 96.12, on the inside. The quotient (in other words, answer) goes on top, one digit at a time. At the beginning, it looks like this:
________
4 | 9 6 . 1 2
Next, you ask how many 4s go into 9 without going over. That would be 2. Since it went into the 9, the answer goes over 9:
_2______
4 | 9 6 . 1 2
-8______
1 6
We multiplied the 4 by 2 to get the 8, which we take from the 9. We get a remainder (if any) and then bring down ONLY the next digit, 6. Now, we repeat this process with the 4 and 16, placing our next answer above the 6:
_2_4____
4 | 9 6 . 1 2
-8______
1 6
-1_6_____
0 1
This time, we can't divide the 4 into 1, so we write "0" up top but repeat the rest of our method on the 12
_2_4. 0_3_
4 | 9 6 . 1 2
-8_______
1 6
-1 6______
0 1
0_ 0____
1 2
-1 2___
0
We know we're done because not only have a zero remainder, but no digits left to bring down. If our remainder wasn't zero, we would create an extra zero on the end of our number, drop it down, and use it to keep dividing until we DID get that zero remainder.
