Question

Marty and Stewart are stuffing envelopes with index cards. They are putting index cards in each envelope. When they are finished, Marty has 15 stuffed envelopes and 4 extra index cards, and Stewart has 12 stuffed envelopes and 6 extra index cards. Write an expression in standard form that represents the number of index cards the boys started with. Explain what your expression means.

Answer 1

The required expression is s = m + n

Explanation:

Let m be the number of index cards stuffed in the envelopes and n be the number of extra index cards.

Let s be the total number of index cards.

Then, s = m + n represents the number of index cards the boys started with.

For Marty,

He has 15 stuffed envelopes and 4 extra index cards.

So, m = 15, n = 4

Therefore, s = 15 + 4 = 19

Marty started with 19 cards.

For Stewart,

He has 12 stuffed envelopes and 6 extra index cards.

So, m = 12, n = 6

Therefore, s = 12 + 6 = 18

Steward started with 18 cards.