Question

Ms. Smith has 24 candy canes and 30 lollipops. She would like to split up the candy evenly and make small gift bags to give to her students. What is the greatest number of gift bags she can make? She wants all gift bags to be identical.

Answer 1

Ms. Smith can make 6 gift bags with 4 candy canes and 5 lollipops in each bag, as 6 is the greatest common divisor of 24 and 30.

Step-by-step explanation:

The question revolves around finding the greatest number of identical gift bags that can be made with a certain number of items, which is a problem of determining the greatest common divisor (GCD). To find the answer, we need to calculate the GCD of 24 candy canes and 30 lollipops. This can be done using the Euclidean algorithm or by listing the factors of each number and finding the highest number that divides both without leaving a remainder.

• Factors of 24: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 12, 24
• Factors of 30: 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 15, 30

The highest common factor is 6. Therefore, Ms. Smith can make 6 gift bags with 4 candy canes and 5 lollipops in each bag.