The ratio of boys to girls in a class is 2:4. If there are 24 students total in the class, how many of them are boys?

2 Answers
Feb 26, 2018

There are 8 boys

Explanation:

Firstly, we can simplify the ratio of boys to girls to 1:2.

Then, to find out how many students each ratio represents, we add up 1 and 2 to get 3 (1+2=3).

By dividing 3 by the number of students, we can find how many students ONE ratio represents: 24/3=8.

So ONE ratio is equal to 8 boys. Since our simplified ratio of boys to girls is 1:2 already, we do not have to do further multiplying - the number of boys is simply 8.

For the girls, simply multiply 2 by 8 to get 16.

Check: 8 "boys" +18 "girls" = 24 "students".

Feb 26, 2018

8

Explanation:

Multiply every number by 4.

If two boys and four girls gives a class size of six, then keeping the 1:2 ratio, 8:16 gives a class size of 24.

An easy way to think of it is in fractions

2/4 = 1/2

but 2 is really 1+1. Now you have three students, so every ratio has to give a class size that's 3x. If

3x=24

then you can just divide by 3 to give you your answer because the boy's is one-third of the entire class. To find the girls, it's 2:3, or 1.5.

Just divide 24 by 1.5 to find your x value (16). To double check our answer, does

8+16=24?

and does

8/16 = 1/2" " ?