Another 6th grade math word problem.

Factual Questions
1

In this thread I asked for help with a math problem and received such good responses that I was able to guide my daughter into figuring out the problem for herself. :slight_smile:

Well, I have another problem (I really do suck at math). I know the board rules on homework help and I want to assure the mods that the answers to these questions are not given to my daughter. They are used as a way of guiding her into figuring out the problem on her own.

The problem:

Farmer Brown sells turkey eggs. They are for people with large appetites. His 100 turkeys lay 10,000 every 100 days.
How many days will it take to lay 1 egg?

If I’ve learned anything from the last problem then I think I should disregard the number of turkeys. But I’m coming up with the turkeys laying 100 eggs a day, which can’t be right. Can you guys and girls help again? :confused:

2

10,000 eggs per 100 days.

So, 10,000 / 100 = 100 eggs per day are produced.
You have 100 turkeys so,

100 / 100 = 1 egg per day per trukey.

Check the math…

1 egg per turkey = 100 eggs per day

100 eggs per day * 100 days = 10,000 eggs.

3

100 turkeys lay 10000 eggs in 100 days
100 turkeys lay 100 eggs in 1 day (1 egg per turkey!)
100 turkeys lays 1 egg in 0.01 days

1 day = 24 * 60 = 1440 minutes
0.01 days = 14.4 minutes.

=> 100 turkeys lay 1 egg in 14.4 minutes.

I think the question might be trying to show the kids that you can’t always work something out purely mathematically.
Looking at it more logically you can say that after 0 days you have 0 eggs and after 1 day you have 100 eggs. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the production of the eggs you get are distributed evenly across the time.

4

Damn…I had forgotten to finish off my numbers to the ultimate answer to the question and was writing a follow-up when I preview I see I was (unsurprisingly) beaten to it.

5

Yes, but the question as posed by the OP is ambiguous: “How many days will it take to lay 1 egg?” 1 day? 0.01 days?

6

The teacher told the kids that the problem is quite simple. I must be the simple one, I’m laying an egg with this problem.
:wink:

7

I was thinking maybe it’s a trick question. There actually is 1 egg layed on day 1, and 99 more as well.

8

For the general thought process of these kinds of problems (things producing something by a certian date): You need to first arrive at a base rate of production and then apply that to the original question.

The basic formula for the production rate is individuals * time = product
In this case, individuals is 100 turkeys, the time is 100 days, and the product is 10,000 eggs.

Or new formula is 100t * 100d = 10,000e. Solve for d and we arrive at 100 eggs per turkey produced in 100 days, or 1 egg per turkey per day.

The original question though, was how many days until an egg is produced. Since there’s 100 turkeys, you make 100 eggs in a day. Flip it around and a single egg is produced in 1/100 of a day, or every 14.4 minutes (as fezpp has shown).

9

Frank #2, fezpp

That must be the answer, though it doesn’t seem quite as simple as the teacher made it out to be.

Thanks to everyone for taking the time to help.

Honey

10

I’d ignore any possible trick, and just give the straight answer: 0.01 days.

11

There’s also the practical aspects to consider (after all the problem mentions the eggs are for people with large appetites, so we are in the real world.)

There is no reason to believe that 100 turkeys each laying 1 egg per day do so in a ‘conveyor-belt’ system. So I don’t agree with 14.4 minutes. If you had a world-wide population of 1,000,000 turkeys, the first egg would not appear practically instantly.

12

I didn’t think about that. It’s possible they don’t lay eggs every day. Or even the same amount of eggs every day. Now I’m really confused again. Arghhhh!

13

So, You’d need to wait until the 100th day to be guaranteed an egg?

14

Cheer up - I think this is just an attempt by the teacher to show that alothough maths is wonderful, you need to take the real world into account too.
For example, what is 1 puddle + 1 puddle? 1 (larger) puddle!

From my limited experience, farmers collect eggs every day. **So it’s perfectly reasonable to say it takes one day to produce 1 egg ** (plus another 99 not required in the answer!).

If the answer to a maths problem is not clear, you should always check you had sufficient information in the question.

15

Ya know, there was something else written after the math problem. I didn’t think it was relevant, so I left it out. Here it is:

If you get the right answer then you can call yourself an eagle, if not, then you are a real chicken.

16

The question is not stated well. It implies “If 10,000 eggs are laid in 100 days, how many are laid in one day?” Using simple ration and proportion, the answer is .01.

17

It also should indicate that an equal number of eggs are laid each day. Written the way it is could mean that all 10,000 eggs were laid on day 100.

18

Stated that way, you’re incorrect. 100 are laid in one day.

Honey, you should print this out and give it to the teacher so he/she knows how poorly worded the question is.

19

Then my daughter’s teacher would know my user name. Ooh boy, I definately wouldn’t want her reading some of the things I’ve posted here. :smiley:

IfyaknowwhatImean?

20

I don’t see why not. Out of those million turkeys, at any given point there’s likely to be one who’s just about almost ready to lay an egg. Unless there’s something causing the turkeys to be synchronized, egg-laying should be approximately uniformly distributed.