Fractions Word Problems Examples

You are whipping up your uncle's famous honey chipotle BBQ sauce for a school fundraiser. The recipe calls for  cup of sugar. You need to make 5 batches of sauce. How much sugar do you need?

cups of sugar

You decide to dye your hair various colors for Halloween. If you dye  of it blue,  pink, and  black, how much of your original hair color is left?

We first need to find out what fraction of your hair is dyed, by adding . 

Our common denominator will be , so  .  

That means that you have colored  of your hair. 

Since you have one whole head of hair, and  , we need to subtract the amount it is dyed from 

.

So,  of your head is still its original color. Better buy some more dye. We suggest a nice, vibrant orange!