Question 46·Easy·Percentages
A bookstore sold 250 books last week. Of these books, 60% were fiction. How many fiction books were sold last week?
For percent problems like this, quickly translate the words into a simple calculation: identify the total, convert the percent to a decimal (divide by 100), and multiply the decimal by the total. Before choosing an answer, do a quick reasonableness check—here, 60% should be a bit more than half of 250—so you can eliminate answers that are too small, too large, or even larger than the total.
Hints
Identify what quantity you are finding
The problem tells you the total number of books and the percentage that are fiction. What does "60% of 250" tell you to do with these numbers?
Rewrite the percent
Change 60% into a decimal or a fraction. How do you usually convert a percent to a decimal?
Use multiplication
Once 60% is written as a decimal, multiply it by 250 to find how many fiction books there are.
Desmos Guide
Enter the percent calculation
In Desmos, type 0.60*250 (or 0.6*250) into an expression line.
Read the output
Look at the value Desmos gives for 0.60*250; that value is the number of fiction books sold.
Step-by-step Explanation
Understand what 60% of 250 means
The problem says 60% of the 250 books were fiction. This means you want to calculate "60 percent of 250," or the part of 250 that corresponds to 60%.
Convert the percent to a decimal and set up the calculation
Convert 60% to a decimal: . Then write the expression for the number of fiction books as:
Multiply to find the number of fiction books and match the choice
Now multiply: . This means 150 of the books were fiction. Looking at the answer choices, this corresponds to choice D, .