Problem Solving

Table Those Ideas

Suppose you live on a farm in Iowa. Your father asks you to go out and count the number of cows and chickens in the barnyard, since he is worried that some of the animals got out through a hole in the fence. You count the animals but decide to play a joke on your father. Rather than tell him how many cows and chickens there are, you tell him that you counted 60 animals in all, and there were a total of 210 legs. Can your father figure out how many cows and chickens there are in the barnyard from this information?

With a partner, see if you can solve this problem for your father. It will be helpful to make a table.

©Glencoe/McGraw-Hill Pre-Algebra