Mrs. A. Price 6th Grade Math & Science TeacherWeb Update Problem of the Week (Math)

Update Problem of the Week (Math) (Instructions)

POW #20-
Got Milk?

The Coburg Dairy delivered 195 gallons, 77 quarts, and 21 pints of dairy products yesterday. How 
many ounces of dairy products did the company deliver?

ANSWER:

POW #19 - 
SSHHHH…SECRET

Jason called six people to tell them a secret; they each called and told four more, and then 
those people each called and told four more. How many people (including Jason) now know the 
secret?

ANSWER: 97 people

POW #18-
BATTER UP!!
Lee Viramonte, a professional baseball player, is planning to ask his manager for a raise based 
on his performance improvements in the past year.  Below are his batting statistics for 2000 and 
2001.

Year				2000			2001
at bats		           	642			625
hits				161			180
home runs			36			63
RBIs				119			141

Based on these numbers, what statistical argument should Lee use to convince his manager to give 
him a raise?

For your short answer:
1.) State Lee’s batting average for both 2000 and 2001 .  Round your answer to the nearest 
thousandth.
2.) State the percentage increase in the number of Lee’s home runs and RBIs from the year 2000 
to the year 2001.
ANSWER:

POW #17-
Showerhead Trivia
PART 1 –
You take one shower a day for 10 minutes.  Low-flow showerheads use 2.5 gallons of water each 
minute as opposed to an older model showerhead that uses 4 gallons per minute.  How much water 
will you save each year, if you install a low-flow showerhead?

PART 2 –
If you then shorten your shower time to 5 minutes in addition to using a low-slow showerhead, 
how much water will be saved?
ANSWER: Part 1 - Save 15 gallons or 5475/year; Part 2 - save 7.5 gallons or 2737.5/year.

POW #16-
Georgina loves milk and she also loves working with numbers.  Just for fun she thought of 
combining a number pattern and the drinking of a gallon of milk.  She imagined asking someone to 
do this.
Start by drinking one-half gallon, then two-thirds of what is left, then three-fourths of what 
is left, and then four-fifths of what is left and so on.
She thought how cool it would be to figure out exactly how much milk would be left!
How much milk did she figure would be left after taking ten drinks??
ANSWER: 1/11

POW #15-
Mary Anne always keeps a bowl of bite size candy bars on her kitchen counter.  On Friday, she 
filled the bowl for her daughter’s friends who would be spending the night.  Her daughter, 
Susan, and her friends Jennifer and Sara, raided the bowl after dinner.   Susan took 1/3 of the 
candy bars, but returned 4 because she felt a little guilty by going ahead of her friends.  
Jennifer then took Ľ of what was left but returned 3 because she wasn’t that hungry.  Sara then 
took ˝ of the remainder but realized she had taken two brands she didn’t like so she put those 
back into the bowl.  The bowl had only 17 candy bars left.  How many candy bars were originally 
in the bowl?
ANSWER: 48 candy bars

POW #14-
No Fours or Fives
Using the digits zero through nine, how many two-digit numbers can be formed which do not 
contain a four or a five?
ANSWER:56

POW #13-
The GMS art club went to Myra’s Day Care Center to make Christmas ornaments with the 3, 4, and 5 
year old pre-school children.  The middle school students and children were seated at round 
table in the art and crafts room.  At each table there was either 1 middle school student with 3 
children or 2 middles school students with 4 children.  There were 23 middle school students and 
61 children in all.  How many tables were being used?
ANSWER: 19 tables

POW #12-
SANTA WAS THINKING THAT HIS REINDEER TEAM RAN A LITTLE SLOW LAST CHRISTMAS EVE.  HE WANTS TO 
ADJUST THE LINE-UP TO SEE IF HE CAN MAKE HIS DELIVERIES AND RETURN TO THE NORTH POLE, MRS. 
CLAUSE, AND A WARM FIRE A LITTLE FASTER THIS YEAR.
THE SLEIGH NEEDS EIGHT REINDEER TO PULL SANTA AND THE TOYS.  ON FOGGY CHRISTMAS EVE’S RUDOLPH 
WILL BE HITCHED TO THE FRONT OF THE TEAM.  IN HOW MANY WAYS CAN SANTA ARRANGE HIS TEAM OF 
REINDEER?
“NOW DASHER! NOW DANCER! NOW, PRANCE AND VIXEN! ON COMET! ON, CUPID!  ON, DONNER AND BLITZEN!  
TO THE TOP OF THE PORCH! TO THE TOP OF THE WALL! NOW DASH AWAY! DASH AWAY! DASH AWAY ALL!!”
ANSWER:40,320 ways

POW #111-
Birthday Bonanza
Your eccentric Aunt Isabella sends money to each niece and nephew on his or her birthday.  She 
gives each child $10.00 on his or her first birthday.  On each birthday thereafter, you and your 
cousins get $20.00 more than on the birthday before.  How old will you be when you have received 
a total of $4,000 from Aunt Isabella?
ANSWER: 20 years old

POW #10-
Mr. Macho’s Appetite
Mr. Macho, my Great Dane, ate 125 hot dogs over a five-day period.  Each day he ate seven more 
hot dogs than on the previous day.  How many hot dogs did he eat on the first day??
ANSWER: 11 hot dogs

POW #9-
Lost Page
You lost your page when you closed your book, but you remembered that the product of the pages 
showing was 16,002.
What were the page numbers?
ANSWER:126 & 127

POW #8-
Mega Nightmares
I shouldn’t have watched that horror movie last night on TV.  It gave me the strangest 
nightmare.  I dreamed I was trapped on a planet of giant insects with Mega-Flies as beg as 
elephants!  I thought it was weird that the female Mega-Flies had 8 legs and the male Mega-Flies 
only had 3 legs.  In my dream, I was caught in the web of a Mega-Spider who would not let me go 
unless I could solve his problem:  How many Mega-Flies would he need to catch if he eats 140 
Mega-Fly legs each day?  He wants to know ALL the possibilities!  What are they?
ANSWER: 1F, 44M; 4F, 36M; 7F, 28M; 10F, 20M; 13F, 12M; 16F, 4M

POW # 7-
At Annie’s Home-Cooked Chicken Wings Restaurant, chicken wings are served by the bucket.  
The “Biggest Bucket O’ Wings” is really big!  Let’s find out how many wings are in it.
If they’re removed two at a time, one wing will be left.  If they’re removed three at a time, 
two wings will remain.  If they’re removed four, five, or six at a time three, four, and five 
wings respectively, will remain.  If they’re taken out seven at a time, no wings will be left 
over.
What is the smallest possible number of wings that could be in the bucket?  How do you know?
ANSWER: 119 wings

POW # 6-
I am thinking of a three-digit number.  It is an odd multiple of three, and the product of its 
digits is 24.  It is larger than 152.  What are all of the numbers I could be thinking of?
ANSWER: 381, 813, 831, 243, 423

POW # 5-
Eric the sheep is lining up to be shorn before the hot summer ahead.  There are 50 sheep in 
front of him.  Eric can’t be bothered with waiting in the line properly, so he decides to sneak 
towards the front.
Every time a sheep is taken to be shorn, Eric then sneaks past 2 sheep.  How many sheep will be 
shorn before Eric?
ANSWER: 17 sheep

POW # 4-
How many times do the hour and minute hands cross in a 12 hour period of time?
ANSWER: 11 times

POW # 3-
I’m looking for two ways to change a dollar bill using exactly 50 coins.  The first way is 40 
pennies, 8 nickels, and 2 dimes.  What’s a second way?
ANSWER: 45 pennies, 2 nickels, 2 dimes, & 1 quarter

POW # 2-
Mattie found out that she would be in the advanced Literature class the following year.  On the 
last day of school, June 12th, the students were given a summer reading list.  The eight books 
on the list were to be read by the first day of school, September 1st.

Mattie and her friends calculated that on average, there are 225 pages per book.  What is the 
minimum number of pages that must be read per day to ensure completion by the first day of 
school?
ANSWER: 22.5 pages per day

POW # 1 -
Six teams are going to play in a tournament.  Each team will play every other team once.  How 
many games will be played in all?
ANSWER: 15 games

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Mrs. A. Price 6th Grade Math & Science

Update Problem of the Week (Math) (Instructions)

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