oh fountain of knowledge that is STW……

my sister has been given an insight to the sort of qeustions that she’ll likely be asked when applying for a job in the navy, albeit as a dental nurse.

one of these was: 1/2 x 1/5

i’m not too bad at math, but it’s been several years since i learnt this (if at all).

how does one go about working out such equations?

How many fingers does she have?

It’s been a while since I did this but I’d say

1/2 = 5/10
1/5 = 2/10

5*2 = 10
10×10 = 100

10/100 = 1/10

My answer is therefore 1/10.

I think that’s right?

the answer is 1/10

achieved by – multiplying the top parts (the numerators) to give the top answer (1×1), and the bottom parts (denominators) to gve the bottom part (2×5=10)

Then to be properly correct you should reduce the fraction to the lowest demoninator.

eg: 1/2 x 2/5 = 2/10 = 1/5

i should have said…. i came up with 0.1 or 1/10. i remembered something about dividing by 100.

and btw – if you have to divide by a fraction, that’s the same as multiplying by the inverse. So simply invert the divisor and then multiply

eg: 2/7 -:- 1/2 = 2/7 x 2/1 = 4/7

chuck and alpin – overcomplicating. Just multiply like I said, no need to even think about it. If adding or subtracting you need to find lowest common denominators, etc. but for these two (mult and div) it’s a p.o.p.

Told you it’d been a while, I’m good at overcomplicating!

fanks folks….!