![]()
There was a report released some time ago which states that many adults are less competent at maths than most 10 year olds. The report made me wonder what level of maths an adult would require to get by in everyday life. I've devised a few examples of the type of problem an adult could be faced with and which could also be handled by a mathematically competent 10 year old. All of the problems can be answered using paper and pencil but feel free to use a calculator if you prefer. For those of you unlucky enough not to have a 10 year old at home, I hope you have fun going back to school.
1) Anne is buying first class stamps at 46p each. How many can she buy for £6.00?
2) What distance will Bill cover by car if he drives at 70mph for 4 hours?
3) Cathy knows that a litre is approximately 1.75 pints. How many times can she completely fill a 1 litre jug from a gallon container?
4) At today’s exchange rate 100 Euros cost £84. When Dan arrives back from his holiday in France he has 25 Euros left. How many pounds will he receive when he converts the Euros back to pounds?
5) Last year, Ellie’s Gym membership cost £45 per month. This year the fees have increased by 5%. How much per month will Ellie have to pay this year?
6) Fred buys a jumper which is reduced by 15% in a sale. He pays £38.25. How much would Fred have paid before the reduction?
7) Gordon, Harry and Iris share £500 so that Harry receives one and a half times as much as Gordon and Iris receives two and a half times as much as Gordon. How much does each receive?
8) James is drawing a plan of his house to a scale of 1cm to 4m. He notices that the area of the back garden on the plan is 20 square centimetres. What will be the real area of the garden in square metres?
9) Katie has decided to decorate her lounge. The lounge is 6 metres long and 4 metres wide and the walls are 2 metres high. The wallpaper Katie chooses is 10 metres long and 0.5 metres wide. Using full lengths only and ignoring off-cuts, wastage, windows etc, how many rolls of wallpaper will Katie need to buy?
10) Katie's friend Liam offers to paint the walls. The paint covers 10 square metres per litre and the walls will need two coats so how many 2.5 litre tins will Liam need to buy?
Link your answers to the intials of the names mentioned in the questions. So the answer to question 1 is A and the answer to question 2 is B and so on up to L.
The required coordinates are:
North 53 3S.TUV West 002 3W.XYZ
S=A-C
T=(F-D)/C
U=(D-A)/2C
V=2(H/G)
W=F/(C+1)
X=E-F-0.25
Y=(J-B)/(A-K)
Z=G+H-I
The cache is a small click lock box with log, pencil and a few small items. It is situated just off a woodland pathway and shouldn't be too muddy. Please re-hide the cache carefully.