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Nov. 14th, 2007 03:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
per_soloOk. I thought today that I had found a "shortcut" in algebra, before going to class...we were doing story problems, and something clicked.
Tom can paint a room in 5 hours, Susan can do it in 6. If the two of them combine efforts, how long will it take them to do it?
There is a longer, drawn out formula, equating to 1/a + 1/b = 1/t
However, if you add the two numbers, you get 11. And then multiply the two, you get 30. The fraction should look something like 30/11, or roughly 2 8/11 hours.
And I was right! The teacher gave me a look like "Yes, that does work". I mentioned that to the girl next to me in class before the quiz, and wouldn't ya know, the question that was in that vein, we both got it right, and several others in class got it wrong.
This ended with her saying that I REALLY needed to find a job in pattern recognition, resulted in me stating "Oh, it's fine when you see the pattern..when you don't? That's when you're screaming in agony over being completely lost". :-P
Just think, only a few more weeks of these interesting math stories left.
Tom can paint a room in 5 hours, Susan can do it in 6. If the two of them combine efforts, how long will it take them to do it?
There is a longer, drawn out formula, equating to 1/a + 1/b = 1/t
However, if you add the two numbers, you get 11. And then multiply the two, you get 30. The fraction should look something like 30/11, or roughly 2 8/11 hours.
And I was right! The teacher gave me a look like "Yes, that does work". I mentioned that to the girl next to me in class before the quiz, and wouldn't ya know, the question that was in that vein, we both got it right, and several others in class got it wrong.
This ended with her saying that I REALLY needed to find a job in pattern recognition, resulted in me stating "Oh, it's fine when you see the pattern..when you don't? That's when you're screaming in agony over being completely lost". :-P
Just think, only a few more weeks of these interesting math stories left.
