Worded problems
“Finding the difference”
A sheep is 65cm tall and a chicken is 40cm tall.
What is the difference in their heights?
65 cm
40 cm
Follow the 6 steps for worded
problems:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Read the question carefully.
Decide which operation is needed.
Write out the number sentence.
Complete the calculation.
Check your answer.
Write the answer out in full.
Let’s follow the steps:
1. Read the question carefully.
A sheep is 65 cm tall, a chicken is 40 cm tall.
What is the difference in their heights?
2. What operation do we need to use?
Subtraction.
3. What is our number sentence?
65cm – 40cm =
4. Complete our calculation.
We will use a number line to help us:
65cm - 40cm = 25cm
10cm + 10cm + 5cm = 25cm
10
40cm
10
50cm
5
60cm
65cm
5. Check our answer.
• Check using the inverse operation. What
is the inverse of subtraction?
Addition
So if:
65cm – 40cm = 25cm
we should find that:
40cm + 25cm = 65cm.
Let’s check using the number line:
40cm + 25cm = 65cm
+ 10
40cm
+ 10
50cm
+5
60cm
65cm
6. Write out our answer.
• 65cm – 40cm = 25cm
• The difference between the height of the
sheep and the chicken is 25cm.
Well done!