#word problems

[inspired-lesson-plans]

Mathematics, grade 4, word problems (real world math)

Note, this post has been edited from its original version to address significant errors.

Do Now:

It's important for truck drivers to know how much their vehicle weighs, because heavy trucks cannot drive on certain roads.

Unfortunately, you do not know how much your truck weighs. You tried looking it up in the driver's manual, and on the internet, but nobody can tell you how much your truck weighs.

Until today! You are delivering lots of chemicals to a company that shall remain confidential. For security, this company has a massive scale at both the entrance and exit so they can make sure that delivery people like you aren't driving away with any stolen goods.

When you enter, you have to stop on top of a giant scale. It says your truck weighs 33,400 pounds.

However, this is not the true weight of your truck, because you came here with a lot of cargo. Each weight below includes the weight of the shipping container.

2,200 pounds of sodium carbonate peroxyhydrate powder

6,210 pounds of sodium hydroxide solution

2,560 pounds of a special chlorine solution (you don't know what's in it)

Before you leave, you drive over to a parking lot where a speaker plays the sounds of exotic birds on a constant loop. Each bird call happens one at a time with an eerie silence in between. There are no trees, only beige concrete. (You cannot share any footage of this bizarre experience, however, because you signed a "no photography" waiver, and you don't want to lose your job 😋) Here, you acquire 2 empty chemical containers, each weighing 125 pounds, and two bigger empty containers each weighing 300 pounds. You also acquire the feeling that you're being haunted by an angry kookaburra.

As you drive away, the scale at the exit says your truck weighs 23,080 pounds.

Calculate how much your truck will weigh when it is completely empty.

Share your calculations with a classmate. Did you get your answers the same way? Come up with reasons why you might have two different weights.

Your truck has 3 axles. Could you have driven on a road with the sign pictured at the beginning of the problem? (1 US ton = 2,000 pounds)

[thatsbelievable]

[dreamyfaeriewords]

The tragic love story between writers and spelling...

Me: I want to be an author and write many books.. Also me: *can’t spell Wednesday correctly on the first try*

I can spend hours weaving sentences together, crafting worlds, and building complex characters… and still stare at the word "necessary" like it personally wronged me.

Yes, I know the difference between "your" and "you’re." Yes, I still type “definately” on the first try every single time. *silent sob*

Well i tell myself that writing is about ideas, not perfect spelling (yes it is). That’s what spellcheck is for. (And sometimes even spellcheck just looks at me like, girl, I have no idea what you meant here.)

So if you’re a writer who occasionally panics over words like "accommodation" , welcome to the club.

[dreamchaserguild]

Sally's Apples

Challenge: Can you solve this story problem without rereading it? Pay close attention!

Sally has a basket with eight apples. Five of the apples are red. Three of the apples are green.

Sally needs to deliver these red and green apples through the dark woods to the hungry kids in the refugee camp. The last person to go through the dark woods never returned.

On the trail, one priest stops Sally and offers her one magical ward in exchange for two apples, but Sally already has a couple magical wards and doesn’t need anymore. She tries to push past the priest, but he says he won’t let her go into the woods unless she gives him at least one apple. So Sally gives him one red apple, then holds up one middle finger to him as she enters the woods.

In the woods, Sally finds another basket of apples next to a skeleton. Oh, that’s what happened to the last person who went into the woods before Sally! The skeleton’s basket has two less red apples than Sally’s and two more green apples. Sally takes all the apples from the second basket and puts them into her own because the skeleton wasn’t going to need them anymore.

Suddenly, a giant hairy insectlike monster with two long antennae, six beady eyes and a long tail with a sharp point like a Scorpion’s (which Sally finds weird because Scorpions are arachnids; not insects) leaps out at her. Sally runs away as fast as she can while carrying her basket filled with a variable number of apples, but she trips and drops one green apple and two red apples.

After a while, Sally gets hungry. She knows these apples need to be delivered to the poor refugee kids, but maybe it wouldn’t hurt to eat one. Sally picks up one red apple and gets ready to eat it. Then she sees a strange tree growing weird purple apples. There are seven purple apples on the tree. Sally picks a purple apple and eats it. It tastes strange and she feels good. Then she picks another and eats it too. Altogether, Sally ate two purple apples. Sally picks the other purple apples and puts them into her basket.

After trudging further into the woods, now feeling good, Sally finds a unicorn with three green apples stuck on its horn. She runs to it and picks the apples from the horn, putting them into her basket one by one. But then she realizes she’s hallucinating and those apples aren’t real. Silly Sally. That’s why you shouldn’t eat mysterious purple apples in dark forests.

Sally throws out the other purple apples. Drugging children is very illegal.

While still super high, Sally trips. Literally in addition to metaphorically. She loses zero green apples and zero red apples. But she hurts her leg and needs to pick up a stick to walk with. A green stick.

Then Sally hears the monster from earlier coming at her from behind. It’s going to eat her, and she can’t run away. So Sally takes her green walking stick and jabs it into one of the monster’s eyes, poking it out. The monster whimpers and runs back into the woods because the monster was a pussy.

But in the struggle, Sally dropped two green apples. But after some searching, she finds one of them and puts it back in her basket.

At last, Sally makes it to the refugees with the remaining red and green apples.

There are six children. Three of the children are dressed in red. Three of the children are dressed in green. The children in green like Sally’s  green walking stick. The children in red do not. Sally wants to divide the apples in a way that each kid gets an equal share of apples that matches the color they’re dressed in. Then Sally realizes that would be stupid and doesn’t do that.

Sally tells the story of her epic journey through the woods after passing out apples for all the kids, and all the children listen intently to Sally’s story.

Did you listen intently to the story? If so, can you tell me...

How many eyes does the monster that chased Sally have?

I cheated and reread the story! I don't deserve to vote and now I'm sad. 😢

Two

Three

Ten

Six

Seven

One

None

Four

Five

Eleven

Eight

Voting ended onSep 29, 2025

(For your convenience, all numbers are ordered in the only correct way: Reverse Alphabetical.)

[slosh-reads-animorphs]

The Animorphs are planning a trip to the Yeerk pool! In Animorphs # 17, The Underground, they must dig a long tunnel in mole morph. Let's help them plan out their trip with math! Their tunnel is dug in shifts and at a downward angle. On their return trip, they must dig out a turn around point and then ascend to the surface. I will share my solutions in a week or so if anyone is interested on trying out a solution of their own.

Note: On pages 94 & 95, it turns out the Animorphs frequently encounter rocks they must go around and at about 25ft deep they luckily find a cave and can stop digging. For simplicity we will pretend they can just dig in a straight line to their destination.

a) Given their 2 hour time limit in mole morph, and assuming an average walk speed, w, what is the maximum length tunnel they can dig while being able to safely return to surface?

b) On page 93, Ax, Tobias, and Marco discuss how long it will take them to complete the tunnel. They estimate that the Yerk pool is 50 feet below ground and that for every 6 feet of tunnel, they dig 1 foot down. Assuming they can maintain this ratio, how much tunnel will they need? Hint: Sin(θ) = 1/6

c) Given the length of tunnel required to reach the Yerk pool, what is the minimum walk speed required for the Animorphs to be able to safely walk down the tunnel and come back in time to demorph?

d) Rachel is the first person to start digging. She gets off to a rocky start but for simplicity, let's assume she begins to dig the tunnel immediately and continues until it’s time to return to the surface. They decide to take one hour shifts (page 91). If Rachel digs at a rate of r feet per second and must walk back up the length of the tunnel in 1 hour, how much tunnel length can she create? Solve symbolically (don't put in numbers just yet).

e) According to various pest control companies online, moles can dig at a maximum rate of about 15 inches per hour. Using this rate, and the walk speed estimated in a), how long is the tunnel from d)? (Plug in numbers now :) )

f) Hardest (but most fun???) The Animorphs take shifts digging. They must descend to the bottom of the tunnel, dig for some time, dig a turn around point, and finally ascend back to the surface. If they must return to the surface in 1 hour, what is the length shift N can dig? Note that each shift spends less time digging due to the extra tunnel length they must traverse.

e) If nothing had gone wrong >_> and the Animorphs were able to dig in a straight line, how many dig shifts would it have taken for them to dig 50 ft deep?

I don’t expect anyone to attempt a solution but I’ve been thinking about this all week. This is the only way I can put my mind at ease.

[copperbadge]

I have a word problem for my math friends this morning, purely to entertain you all. 

In Illinois a lot is tied to the address that the state has in its records (tres problematic) but we apparently didn’t pay for a system that can read minor variations in that address, so you have to enter your address exactly as it appears in their records, which you have no way of viewing, and some systems alter that address when speaking to each other, so you can’t “learn” your standard address and write it down somewhere. My address might include a number of capital letters and stops, but I can’t tell which ones because on my driver’s license and home ownership documents it’s in all caps with no stops, and some systems might strip out only caps or only stops. 

Let’s say my address is 100 North Whatnot Street and I live in unit 200 in that building. Presuming there’s no typos:

“North” could be N, n, N., n., North, north, or NORTH

"Whatnot” could be Whatnot, whatnot, or WHATNOT

“Street” could be Street, street, STREET, St, st, ST, St., st., or ST.

The above might be separated from the unit number by a space, a comma, or an entirely separate data field.

The prefix to my unit number could be Unit, unit, UNIT, Apartment, apartment, APARTMENT, Apt, apt, APT, Apt., apt., APT., or nonexistent (ie just the number).

Chicago and IL are fixed in the system as separate data points for certain, so presumably they’re all right. 

My zipcode could be either the standard six digits or the more official ten. 

So what we have for 100 North Whatnot Street Unit 200 Chicago IL 606whatever is

[fixed] [7 variables] [3 variables] [9 variables] [3 variables] [13 variables] [fixed] [fixed] [fixed] [2 variables]. 

I suppose this could also be expressed as 1[1-7][1-3][1-9][1-3][1-13]111[1-2] but that’s where I stop knowing what to do. 

Given the above, how many ways are there to present my address to a system? Do not feel you need to show your work because the odds are significant that I will not understand it. I’m prepared to blindly accept guesses, given the stakes for this are very low. 

This word problem brought to you by a state-run website that requires three separate webpages of information and, if I don’t enter the address that correctly matches theirs, takes me back to the first page to fill out my (1) email, password, security question, (2) Full name, DOB, (3) full address with no errors over again. (It’s fine, I’m going to phone them later today.)

[er-cryptid]

Area of a Sector Ex 5

Patreon

[landsharkattack]

I have inadvertently done Word Problem Behavior.

I am the proud (?????) owner of 96 compasses.

Let's draw some circles I guess.