Question

A theater has 44 seats in the first row, 48 seats in the second row, 52 seats in the third row, and so on. How many seats are there in row 18?

There are
seats in row 18.

Answer 1

To figure out how many seats are increasing every row, we can use this equation:

• 48 - 44 = 4

Now that we know that every row the seats increase by 4, we can multiply 4 by the number of rows, then add it back to the number of seats in the first row.

• (17 × 4) + 44 = 112

(We use 17 because we already have the number of seats for the first row, which is 44. If there are 18 rows, we simply don't count the first one.)

To check our work, we can add instead of multiply.

1. The first row has 44 seats.
2. 44 + 4 = 48
3. 48 + 4 = 52
4. 52 + 4 = 56
5. 56 + 4 = 60
6. 60 + 4 = 64
7. 64 + 4 = 68
8. 68 + 4 = 72
9. 72 + 4 = 76
10. 76 + 4 = 80
11. 80 + 4 = 84
12. 84 + 4 = 88
13. 88 + 4 = 92
14. 92 + 4 = 96
15. 96 + 4 = 100
16. 100 + 4 = 104
17. 104 + 4 = 108
18. 108 + 4 = 112

There are 112 seats in row 18.