Word Problem Strategies

Each of the problems below is a link. If you click on the problem, it will take you to a YouTube video of a full, step-by-step solution for the problem. You may try these problems as practice and use the videos to check your answer, or you can just watch the videos to see more worked-out example problems.

Please follow these steps when solving word problems. If you follow them, you should always know what to do next and you're less likely to get stuck. If you don't follow them, you're much more likely to get lost, forget a piece of information, or make a mistake when solving a word problem.

Steps for solving word problems:

  1. Read the problem. Make sure you understand the situation.

  2. Write your "let" statements for the unknown quantities.

  3. Write an equation that models the situation.

  4. Solve the equation.

  5. State the conclusion.

1. Three more than twice a number is 31. Find the number.
2. Four subtracted from eight times a number is 52. What is the number?
3. Carlos and Monica collect baseball cards. Carlos has seven more baseball cards than Monica has. They have 73 baseball cards in total. How many baseball cards does each person have?
4. Harry decided to buy Valentine’s Day presents for his wife and his coworker. He purchased a necklace and a CD, costing him a total of $185. The necklace cost $141 more than the CD. How much did each gift cost?
5. A 30 ft pipe is to be cut into two pieces. The first piece must be six feet less than twice the length of the second piece. Find the length of each piece of pipe.
6. A 60 in wire has been cut into three pieces. The second piece is five inches shorter than the first piece. The third piece is half as long as the first piece. How long is each piece of wire?
7. A cheeseburger and French fries contain 1015 calories in total. The cheeseburger contains 80 fewer calories than twice the calories in the French fries. How many calories does each item contain?