Solutions

Excellent!  Are you ready to check your child’s answer? Look below to see if their solution matches ours.

Lower Elementary:
Answer:   80 miles
Solution:  Since 15 minutes is a quarter of an hour, there are 4 15-minute periods in each hour. That means the sea turtle swims 5, 10, 15, 20 miles in an hour. So, in 4 hours, the sea turtle swims 20, 40, 60, 80 miles.

Upper Elementary:
Answer:   3,200 times the weight
Solution:  A ton is 2,000 pounds, so 200 tons is 200 × 2,000 = 400,000 pounds. If we divide 400,000 by 125, we get 3,200. Therefore, the blue whale is 3, 200 times the weight of the Hector’s dolphin.

Middle School:
Answer:  12 days
Solution:  Each day, the 5 pandas eat 30 × 5 = 150 pounds of bamboo. So, the pandas decrease the amount of bamboo by 150 pounds each day. The bamboo grows 145 pounds each day. So, overall, the bamboo decreases by 5 pounds per day. If the sanctuary currently has 60 pounds of bamboo, that means that the pandas will run out of bamboo in 60 ÷ 5 = 12 days.

Algebra and Up:
Answer:   y = ^–10(x – 1)² + 10
Solution:  The vertex of a parabola that opens down, like the model of the leap, is the highest point. So, the vertex of our model will be (1, 10). To write our equation, we first plug h and k into our general form: y = a(x – 1)² + 10. Next, we use a known point on the parabola and plug those values in for x and y. Let’s use the origin: 0 = a(0 – 1)² + 10. If we solve for a, we get a = ^–10. So, our equation that models the leap is y = ^–10(x – 1)² + 10.

Note: Answers may vary with different domains and forms of the equation.