Question

Leon has two boxes with coloured pencils. Boxed A contained 3/8 of all his coloured pencils. Leon removes 2/5 of the pencils from box B to colour a picture. If 15 pencils are used to colour his picture, how many pencils are there in box A?​

Answer 1

Explanation:

Let's assume that Leon has 'x' number of coloured pencils. According to the question, Box A contains 3/8 of all his coloured pencils.So, Box B contains (1-3/8) = 5/8 of all his coloured pencils. Therefore, number of pencils in Box A = (3/8) * x Also, number of pencils in Box B = (5/8) * x According to the question, Leon removes 2/5 of the pencils from Box B to colour a picture. So, pencils used from Box B = (2/5) * (5/8) * x = (1/4) * x And the total number of pencils used for the picture = 15. So, pencils used from Box A = 15 - (1/4) * x Now, the total pencils used in the picture = pencils used from Box A + pencils used from Box B Therefore, 15 = 15 - (1/4) * x + (1/4) * x Thus, x = 60 Therefore, number of pencils in Box A = (3/8) * 60 = 22.5. Hence, there are 22.5 pencils in Box A.