Question

Hi I need help with this question. Melissa starts with four packages of balloons and 8 single balloons. Her brother gave her 20 more balloons and three more packages. She now has twice the number of balloons she started with. Write and solve an equation to find how many balloons are in a package. How many balloons did Melissa start with?

Answer 1

Okay, here we have this:

Let's take the packages as (x), so we obtain:

Melissa Starts with: 4x+8 ballons (1)

Her brother gave her: 3x+20 ballons (2)

And as she now has twice the number of balloons she started with. This mean that:

2(4x+8)=(3x+20)+(4x+8)

Let's clear x in this equation:

8x+16=3x+20+4x+8

8x+16=7x+28

8x-7x=28-16

x=12

Finally we obtain that in a package are 12 ballons, now let's calculate How many balloons did Melisa start with?:

Remember that Melissa Starts with: 4x+8 ballons, so replacing x with 12, we obtain that Melissa Starts with: 4(12)+8=48+8=56.

Finally we obtain that Melissa Starts with 56 ballons.