Video Transcript
A green vase is seven inches high. A purple vase is 28 inches high. How many times taller is the purple vase than the green one?
One way to find out what this problem is asking us is to draw a sketch. And in this problem, it’ll really help. So, let’s do that. First, we’re told the height of a green vase. It’s seven inches high. Next, we’re told the height of another vase, a purple one. And we’re told that it’s 28 inches high. And we’re asked, how many times taller the purple vase is than the green one?
A bar model would also be a good way of visualizing the problem. This bar represents our purple vase, 28 inches tall. And of course, our smaller bar represents our green vase, seven inches tall. Now we need to be very careful here not to make a mistake. The question isn’t asking us how much more taller is the purple vase than the green one. If it was asking us that, then we’d need to find the difference in height between the two. And we’d need to work out 28 minus seven. But our question isn’t asking us that.
Our problem asked us, how many times taller is the purple vase than the green one? How many times will this green vase fit on top of each other to reach the height of the purple vase? How many times will this smaller bar fit into the larger bar? How many times will seven fit into 28? What is 28 divided by seven?
Let’s go through our seven-times table facts. One times seven is seven. Two sevens are 14. There are three sevens in 21. And there are four sevens in 28. So, if we were to complete our bar model, it would show the number seven four times. Four lots of seven equal 28. And so, let’s use this information to help us complete the problem. How many times taller is the purple vase than the green one? The purple vase is four times taller.
