How many meters of fencing material must be used?

Question

A fence is to placed along a rectangular plot so that enclosed area is 99 LaTeX: ft^2
f
t
2
and the length of the plot is two feet more than the width. How many meters of fencing material must be used?

Answer 1

Well, you have a rectangular area, so if you multiply the length of one short side by the length of one long side you should get your area, which as you said is 99 square feet. We also know that the short sides are 2 feet shorter than the long sides. So step one is to figure out the length of your sides.

There are a couple of ways that you could do that:

You could try an algebraic equation where "s" is the length of your long side and "(s-2)" is the length of your short side and solve for "s":

s × (s-2) = 99

Or, you could use some guess and check to try to find two numbers that have a difference of 2 that multiply together to get 99

for instance, 8ft × 10ft = 80 square ft, which is too small, so try going up one foot on each side.

Once you have determined the length of your long sides and your short sides, remember that the question is asking you for the length of fencing required to go around the WHOLE THING, not just 1 long side and one short side. So, you will have to take the length of your short side × 2, and then add the length of your long side ×2. That should give you the total feet of fencing needed to go around the entire rectangle.

I tried to give you a guide, instead of just answering it for you. Hope this helps!