Question

At a store, apples cost $0.80 each and oranges cost $0.95 each. Harry buys some apples and oranges and spends $9.55. He buys a total of 11 pieces of fruit. Write a system of linear equations to describe this situation. Be sure to define your variables.

Answer 1

To describe this situation, we can use the system of linear equations. We define the variables 'a' for the number of apples and 'o' for the number of oranges. The equations are a + o = 11 and 0.80a + 0.95o = 9.55.

Step-by-step explanation:

To write a system of linear equations for this situation, we need to define our variables. Let's use the variable 'a' to represent the number of apples Harry buys, and 'o' to represent the number of oranges he buys. Since each apple costs $0.80, the cost of the apples can be expressed as 0.80a. Similarly, the cost of the oranges, which cost $0.95 each, can be expressed as 0.95o.

We know that Harry buys a total of 11 pieces of fruit, so we can write the equation a + o = 11. We also know that the total cost of the fruit he buys is $9.55, so we can write the equation 0.80a + 0.95o = 9.55.

Therefore, the system of linear equations that describes this situation is:

a + o = 11

0.80a + 0.95o = 9.55