SAT Test Questions
Sample 1
A store was charged $12.60 for a particular item. If the store wants to make a profit of 10% of their selling price, what would a customer have to pay for each item?
Solution one
Strategy - Trial and error & guess and check: estimate profit
Data $12.60 is the cost per item
If sell for $13.00, then profit is 10% of $13.00 or $1.30
$1.30 + $12.60 = $13.90
Therefore, $13.90 is more than $13.00 so it needs to be sold for more than $13.00.
What about $14.00, that doesn’t seem to enough, but I’ll see how much it changes and decide from there…. WOW! 10% of $14.00 is $1.40 and $12.60 + $1.40 = $14.00… COOL!
Solution 2
Strategy - Algebra
x = selling price
y = mark up
.1x = y
y + $12.60 = x
x - $12.60 = y
.1x + $12.60 = x
Solution 3
Strategy - Trial and error & guess and check: thinking repeated addition or division
$12.60/.9 = x ; Think how many .9 are in 12.6 (there are 12 ones so if there needs to be more than 12 for .9) (there are 10 nine tenths in nine, and two nine tenths are 1.8 so four would be 3.6 and 9 + 3.6 = 14.) COOL!
Sample 2 -
A shipper has boxes that are cubes 2x2x2. The largest box the shipper has on hand is 5x6x8. How many cubes will fit in the larger box?
Solution one
Strategy Reasoning with repeated addition or division
8 cubic units and 240 cubic units,
240 cubic units / 8 cubic units = 30 boxes.
Solution two
Strategy Draw a picture
Cube 2x2x2.
Large box 5x6x8
Draw a diagram of the large box and mark the dimensions on the edges of the diagram.
2 box lengths x 3 box lengths x 4 box lengths = 24 boxes