Exercise Set: Problem Solving

1. Miss Anna is driving her car from Butuan City to Davao City. After driving for about 2.9 hours, she
reaches Tagum City and sees a sign “Butuan City 231 km, Davao City 76.6 km”. If she continues to drive
at the same average speed, after how many hours will she reach Davao City?

Look for average speed (speed = distance / time)

Speed = 231 km/ 2.9 hours

= 79.65 kph

Look for time (time = distance/ speed)

Time = 76.6 km/ 79.65 kph

= 0.9616 hour

2. Alvin can finish cleaning their house in 4 hours, while his younger sister can finish it in 6 hours. If they
do it together, what fraction of the house can they finish in one hour?

Alvin = ¼ then 3/12 Younger sister = 1/6 then 2/12 3/12 + 2/12 = 5/12 of the house

3. What are the unit of digit of 71? Of 72? Of 73? In general, given a positive integer n, what is the units of
digit of 7 15?

4. The sum of 25 consecutive integers is 1575. What is the smallest among the integers?

X + (x + 2) + (x + 4) + (x + 6) + (x + 8) + (x + 10) + (x + 12) + (x + 14) + (x + 16) + (x + 18) + (x + 20) + (x + 22)

+ (x + 24) + (x + 26) + (x + 28) + (x + 30) + (x + 32) + (x + 34) + (x + 36) + (x + 38) + (x + 40) + (x + 42) + (x +
44) + (x + 46) + (x + 48) = 1, 575

25x + 600 = 1,575

25x = 1,575 -600

25x = 975
25 25
X = 39
5. Four skilled workers can finish 750 armchairs in 5 days. At this rate, if 9000 armchairs should be
finished in 15 days, how many more skilled workers should be hired?

4 skilled worker – 750 armchairs – 5 days

Xxxxx – 9000 armchair – 15 days

[(9000 / 750) / (15/ 5)] * 4 = 16 workers

6. A class of 35 students took exams in English and in Filipino. If 11 passed the English exam, 22 passed
the Filipino exam, and four failed in both exams, how many students passed both exams?

English – 35 – 11 = 24
 Filipino – 35 – 22 = 13

Both = 35 – (24 + 13 – 4)

Both = 2 student

)7. One elevator of a tall building started from a certain floor, went up 7 floors, and stopped. Then it
went 20 floors down and stopped. Then it went up to the floor twice as high as the previous floor where
it stopped. Then it went down 7 floors and finally stopped on the 63 th floor. At what floor did the
elevator start?

X = 63 + 7 – 40 + 20 – 7

X = 43th floor

8. How many diagonals does a convex quadrilateral have? A convex pentagon? A convex hexagon? In
general, make a conjecture on the number of diagonals a convex n-gon has.

Number of Number of
Polygon
Sides Diagonals

Quadrilateral 4 2

Pentagon 5 5

Hexagon 6 9

Octagon 8 20

Decagon 10 35

n-gon n n(n – 3) / 2