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2 votes
Ali finished his history assignment in 1/4

hours. Then he completed his math assignment in 2/3
hours. What was the total amount of time Ali spent doing these two assignments?

1 Answer

6 votes
Hello there!

For this you simply need to give both fractions a common denominator!

The easiest way to do this specific problem would be to make the denominator 12. Why 12? Because 4 x 3 = 12.

So:

1/4 --> ?/12 --> 1 (3) / 12 --> 3/12

2/3 --> ?/12 --> 2 (4) / 12 --> 8/12

Total amount of time means the sum (adding them together).

When adding fractions, you MUST have a common denominator! (Which is what we just did).

So 3/12 + 8/12 = (8+3) / 12 = 11/12 hours

Notice how the denominator stayed the same? When adding/subtracting fractions, the denominator stays the same! :)

Hope this helped!

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