PSSA - Pennsylvania System of School Assessment

Edward Bujak

The number of hours it takes to paint a house varies inversely as the number of workers. Using the information in the table, how
many hours would it take 6 workers to complete the job?

A 9
B 10
C 10.8
D 12

data = 882, 36<, 84, 18<, 85, 14.4<<;

Since the data is in a table and it look related, we can say the number of hours is a function of the number of workers,
h(w) = f(w)

We are told that the number of hours varies inversely with the number of workers, so
1
h(w) ∂ w
[1]
k
h(w) = w
[2]
where k is a contant.

If you take the first data point (2,36) [any point will do], then Equation [2] becomes
k
36 = 2
therefore k = 72 and
72
h(w) = w
[3]

Define a function:

72
h@w_D := ;
w

h@6D

12

So if there are 6 workers it will take 12 hours to paint the house.

2 PSSA.20090305.D.Inverse variation.nb

Graphically:

The supplied data set will be green.

dataPointPlot1 = ListPlot@data,
PlotStyle → 8PointSize@0.03D, Green<D;

The data value at (6,h[6]) will be red.

dataPointPlot2 = ListPlot@886, h@6D<<,

PlotStyle → 8PointSize@0.03D, Red<D;

Plot the h(w) function for domain [0,8], i.e the number of workers is 0 to 8.

curveFitPlot = Plot@h@wD, 8w, 0, 8<,

PlotRange → 880, 8<, 80, 80<<,
AxesLabel → 8" Workers", " Hours"<,
PlotLabel → " Workers vs Hours to paint a house"D

Ò Workers vs Ò Hours to paint a house

Ò Hours
80

60

40

20

0 Ò Workers
0 2 4 6 8

Show@curveFitPlot, dataPointPlot1, dataPointPlot2D

Ò Workers vs Ò Hours to paint a house

Ò Hours
80

60

40

20

0 Ò Workers
0 2 4 6 8