Ellen, Giselle, and Brenda bake 111 cookies. Giselle bakes twice as many cookies as Brenda. Ellen bakes 9 fewer cookies than Giselle. How many cookies does Ellen bake?

2 Answers
Sep 26, 2016

#39# cookies

Explanation:

Brenda baked
#24# cookies

since Giselle baked twice as many as Brenda, she baked #48#
#(24)(2)#

Ellen baked #9# fewer than Brenda so subtract
#48−9=39#

if you add up the total of cookies you get
#111#

#24+48+39=111#

(to get the answer for one person, you may just have to plug in random numbers to find out what works)

Sep 26, 2016

Ellen has baked #39# cakes.

Explanation:

Suppose Brenda has baked #x# number of cakes.

Then, Giselle has baked twice as many i.e. #2x# cakes

and Ellen has baked #9# fewer then Giselle i.e. #2x-9# cakes.

As total number of cakes are #111#

#x+2x+2x-9=111#

#5x=111+9=120#

and #x=120/5=24#

Hence, Ellen has baked #24xx2-9=39# cakes.