Question

Jaimie baked 24 cupcakes.Her sister Mia ate 3 cupcakes, and her brother David ate 2 cupcakes. Which expression can Jaimie use to find how many cupcakes are left?

A 24+(3-2)
B 24-(3+2)
C (24-3)+2
D 24-(3-2)

Answer 1

Well,

Plainly a total of 5 cupcakes were taken away from the motherload of 24 cupcakes. So the expression must be equivalent to 19.

24 + (3-2) = 24 + 1 = 25
Not right.

24 - (3 + 2) = 24 - 5 = 19
Right!

The correct option is B.

Answer 2

The correct answer would be letter B. 24-(3+2)
Mia ate three cupcakes and David ate two cupcakes. (2+3) = five cupcakes missing. Now using Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally, we know parenthesis go first. When we add them together to get five all that is left to do is this:
24-5=19.
Five cupcakes went missing and only 19 remain.