Question

Joe has a board that is 6 feet long and needs to cut it into 15 pieces. How can he solve this problem using two different methods?

a) Method 1: Divide the board into 15 equal pieces, each 6/15 feet long. Method 2: Find the length of each piece by dividing 6 by 15.
b) Method 1: Divide the board into 6 equal pieces, each 15 feet long. Method 2: Find the length of each piece by dividing 15 by 6.
c) Method 1: Divide the board into 3 equal pieces, each 2 feet long. Method 2: Find the length of each piece by multiplying 6 by 15.
d) Method 1: Divide the board into 10 equal pieces, each 0.6 feet long. Method 2: Find the length of each piece by adding 6 to 15.

Answer 1

To divide a 6-foot board into 15 pieces, Method 1 involves dividing 6 by 15 to get 0.4 feet per piece, while Method 2 involves converting to inches (72 inches for the board) and then dividing by 15 to get 4.8 inches per piece.

Step-by-step explanation:

To solve the problem of dividing a 6-foot board into 15 equal pieces, two different methods can be used:

Method 1

Could you divide the total length of the board by the number of pieces you need? Here, you would divide 6 feet by 15 to find the length of each piece. That is:

6 feet ÷ 15 = 0.4 feet per piece.

Method 2

Convert the board length to inches first, because it might be easier to measure. There are 12 inches in a foot, so the board is 72 inches long. Then divide by 15:

72 inches ÷ 15 = 4.8 inches per piece.

With both methods, you have calculated the size of each piece but in different units, from one in feet and the other in inches, according to your measuring convenience.