-5/6 +(-5/18)=?

Question

sturggling with fractions

Answer 1

Since you are adding a negative, you can take away the addition sign and the parentheses to make it look like this: -5/6 - 5/18

In order to subtract, you need to find a common denominator: 6 goes into 18, so 18 is your common denominator. You multiply the numerator and denominator of -5/6 by 3 so you can have a fraction with a denominator of 3: -5/6 * 3/3 = -15/18

Your new equation should be: -15/18 - 5/18

Now you subtract the numerators across and keep the denominator the same:

Numerator = -15 - 5 = -20

Your answer should be -20/18

If your teacher asks you to simplify your answer, you would divide by a multiple of both 20 and 18. The best number to divide by would be 2:

Numerator: -20/2 = -10

Denominator: 18/2 = 9

So your simplified answer would be -10/9

To find the mixed fraction, you would divide -10 by 9 and place the remainder as your numerator:

-10/9 = -1  1/9

Answer 2

Rewrite fractions with the same denominator (preferably the lowest factor for both numbers.  This is 18 in his case.

-5/6 + (-5/18) = -15/18 + (-5/18)

Now that we have done that we can add the numerators  and place the answer over the denominator.

-15 + (-5) = -20/18

The answer then is -1and 2/18 or -1and 1/9if we want the answer as a mixed number. 

Hope that helps!