Question

Jasmine bought 5 items for lunch that cost a total of $4.55. Hot dogs cost $1.10 each and cookies cost $.75 each. Which system of equations below could be used to determine h, the number of hot dogs, and c, the number of cookies, Jasmine bought for lunch.

Answer 1

We start by calling H the number of hotdogs and C the number of cookies.

If the total number of items is 5, it has to be equal to the sum of H + C:

`H+C=5`

The money spent in hotdogs is equal to the price of each hotdog ($1.10) times the number of hotdogs she bought, H. This is 1.10*H.

For the cookies, the cost will be, following the same analysis (price times quantity), 0.75*C.

If the total spent, adding hotdogs and cookies, is $4.55, then the equation can be written as:

`1.10H+0.75C=4.55`

Now, we have a system of equations that has 2 unknowns (H and C) and 2 equations:

`\begin{gathered} H+C=5 \\ 1.10H+0.75C=4.55 \end{gathered}`