Sam is 2 inches shorter than Isobel, who is 3 inches taller than
Marlee. Marlee is 6 inches shorter than Noah. Write an equation that
you could use to find Noah's height if you knew Sam's height?

I know, I'm a bozo, but I just totally suck at math and my daughter
needs the answer ASAP !!

Please and Thanks

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Request for Question Clarification by scriptor-ga on 14 Sep 2004 17:30 PDT

Dear evets,

It is my duty to refer to Google Answers' policy concerning this kind of questions:

"Please note that we reserve the right to remove questions from the
site for any reason, and questions that are clearly homework may be
subject to deletion."
http://answers.google.com/answers/faq.html#homework

Regards,
Scriptor
	
Answer

Dear evets,

I will explain to you, so that you can explain to your daughter, how
to formulate this problem algebraically.

Let's use the first letter of each person's name to represent their height, so

  S = Sam's height
  I = Isobel's height
  M = Marlee's height
  N = Noah's height.

Now, we are told that Sam is two inches shorter than Isobel, so we write

  S = I-2.

And Isobel is 3 inches taller than Marlee, so

  I = M+3.

Finally, Marlee is 6 inches shorter than Noah.

  M = N-6

To express Noah's height, N, in terms of Sam's height, S, we start
with what we know about N and keep substituting equations until we
have an expression that depends only on S.

First,

  M = N-6

implies

  N = M+6,

and from I = M+3 we have M = I-3, so

  N = (I-3)+6 = I+3,

but S = I-2 implies I=S+2, ergo

  N = (S+2)+3 = S+5.

In conclusion, Noah's height is 5 inches greater than Sam's height.

Regards,

leapinglizard

Thank you immensely, and I apologize for "pushing the envelope" in
regards to the nature of the question; ie homework...

Thanks for the tip. In regard to homework questions, I don't see an
ethical problem if you're not fobbing off a Researcher's answer as
your own, but using it as a guide to assist you in learning.

leapinglizard