Question

A piece of a wire metres long broke into two pieces. One piece was meter long. How long is the other piece?

Answer 1

Length of the wire = $\frac{7}{8}\mathrm{m}$
Length of one piece of wire = $\frac{1}{4}\mathrm{m}$
Let the length of the second piece of wire be x m.

∴ Length of the wire = Length of one piece + Length of the second piece
$$\begin{gathered} \frac{7}{8}=\frac{1}{4}+x \\ x=\frac{7}{8}-\frac{1}{4} \\ x=\frac{7\times 1}{8\times 1}-\frac{1\times 2}{4\times 2}=\frac{7}{8}-\frac{2}{8}=\frac{7-2}{8} \\ x=\frac{5}{8}\mathrm{m} \end{gathered}$$
Therefore, the length of the second piece is $\frac{5}{8}\mathrm{m}$.