Question

What are three consecutive integers so that the sum of the second and third is sixteen more than the first?

Answer 1

13,14 and 15

Explanation:

So we want 3 integers that are consecutive (such as 1, 2, 3). We don't know them (yet) but we'd write them as x, x+1 and x+2.

Now the second condition of our problem is that the sum of the second and third numbers (x+1 and x+2) must equal the first plus 16 (x+16). We would write that like this:

`(x+1)+(x+2)=x+16`
Now we solve that equation for x:
`x+1+x+2=x+16`
add 1 and 2
`x+x+3=x+16`
subtract x from both sides:
`x+x-x+3=x-x+16`
`x+3=16`
subtract 3 from both sides:
`x+3-3=16-3`
`x=13`
So the numbers are:
`x=13`
`x+1=14`
`x+2=15`