Question

Patty is building a rope ladder for a tree house. She needs two 5 foot pieces of rope for the sides of the ladder. She needs 7 pieces of rope, each 18 inches long, for the steps. How many feet of top does patty need to make the ladder

Answer 1

20 1/2 feet

Explanation:

The total length is found by adding the lengths of the individual pieces. It can be easier if you use multiplication in place of repeated addition. You want ...

(2 × 5 feet) + (7 × 18 inches)

At some point in the process, you need to convert inches to feet. This is done by remembering that 12 inches = 1 foot. Dividing inches by 12 gives feet.

The above expression evaluates to

10 feet + 126 inches = 10 feet + (126/12) feet = 10 feet + 10.5 feet

= 20.5 feet

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