Algebra World problem

Question

Sarah took the advertising department from her company on a round trip to meet with a potential client. Including Sarah a total of 14 people took the trip. She was able to purchase coach tickets for

$180 and first class tickets for $990.

She used her total budget for airfare for the​ trip, which was $9810.

How many first class tickets did she​ buy? How many coach tickets did she​ buy?

Answer 1

Hi Sydney G.,

You solve this problem the same way as you (should!) solve every other word-problem -- decide what is known, what is unknown, then assign a variable to stand for something unknown in the problem. In the present case, a single variable will do; but in more complicated situations, in which there are multiple relationships between items, you may end up using up to as many variables as there are relationships.

So, here, let's assign x to represent the number of coach tickets she buys. [Try to always assign the variable to be something very basic, in the problem.] Can you write an equation to express the total she spends, knowing the price of each type of ticket, and the numbers of each type of ticket? (Hint: the number of first class tickets is also an expression involving the variable x. What else do you know that makes it possible to write that expression, and use it in your equation?

Then, solve that equation for the variable x.

-- Cheers, -- Mr. d.