8: Advanced Proportional - Multiplication and Division

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Nick is making cushion covers to raise money for the school camp. Each cover takes two thirds of a metre of fabric. He has 5 metres of fabric. How many covers can he make?

Student: There are 3 thirds in each metre of fabric so there are 15 thirds in 5 metres. Each cover takes 2 thirds, so he can make 7 covers because 2 times 7 is 14 thirds and then there is 1 third left over.

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Students at the Advanced Proportional stage are learning to select from a repertoire of part-whole strategies to solve and estimate the answers to problems involving fractions, proportions, and ratios. These strategies are based on finding common factors and include strategies for the multiplication of decimals and the calculation of percentages.