Question

Kevin is working with a group of community volunteers to replace rotting boards over the river walkway. They need to replace 7 boards that are each 3/4 feet long. How many total feet of board will they need for the job?

This is a multiplication problem, because we have 7 sets of the same item. Set up the multiplication expression.

7 x _

Multiply the numerator of the fraction by the whole number.

(7x3)/4 = _/4
_ ft

Answer 1

To set up the multiplication expression for the total length of the boards needed, we have:

\[ 7 \times \frac{3}{4} \text{ feet} \]

Now, we multiply the numerator of the fraction (3) by the whole number (7):

\[ 7 \times 3 = 21 \]

So we can write the expression as:

\[
\frac{21}{4} \text{ feet}
\]

To make it easier to interpret, we can convert \(\frac{21}{4}\) into a mixed number:

\[
21 \div 4 = 5 \quad \text{remainder} \quad 1
\]

This means:

\[
\frac{21}{4} = 5 \frac{1}{4} \text{ feet}
\]

Thus, they will need a total of:

\[
\frac{21}{4} \text{ feet} \text{ or } 5 \frac{1}{4} \text{ feet of board for the job.}
\]