Question

A box contains apples and oranges. The ratio of apples to oranges is 5:3. If there are 15 oranges in the box, how many apples are in the box?

Answer 1

25 apples are in the box

Explanation:

You should set up a proportion to compare apples to oranges based on the given ratio and the ratio that you want to find:

`(5 "apples")/(3 "oranges") = (x "apples")/(15 "oranges")`

The left side shows the proportion of apples to oranges that you've given me, and the right side shows the number of apples that we want to find over the new quantity of oranges.

You can solve this one of two way: cross multiplication or division then multiplication.

First method: Cross multiplication

Multiply 5 and 15 together:

`5"apples" xx 15"oranges"` = `75`

Multiply 3 and x together:

`3xxX` = `3x`

Set 3x and 75 equal to each other and solve for x:

`(3x)/3 = 75/3`

`x = 25`

Second Method:

Divide the numerators (largest value by smallest value):

`(15 "oranges")/(3 "oranges")` = `5`

Multiply that value by the number of apples that were given to you to obtain the new number of apples that are in the box:

`5xx5` = 25

There you have it! I hope I explained the info clearly!