GRADE 7 MATHEMATICS

Lesson 5: Reasoning about Equations and Tape

Diagrams (Part 2)
Let’s use tape diagrams to help answer questions about situations where the equation
has parentheses.

5.1: Algebra Talk: Seeing Structure

Solve each equation mentally.

5.2: More Situations and Diagrams m.openup.org/1/7-6-5-2

Draw a tape diagram to represent each situation. For some of the

situations, you need to decide what to represent with a variable.

1. Each of 5 gift bags contains pencils. Tyler adds 3 more pencils to each bag.
Altogether, the gift bags contain 20 pencils.

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2. Noah drew an equilateral triangle with sides of length 5 inches. He wants to increase
the length of each side by x inches so the triangle is still equilateral and has a
perimeter of 20 inches.

3. An art class charges each student $3 to attend plus a fee for supplies. Today, $20 was
collected for the 5 students attending the class.

4. Elena ran 20 miles this week, which was three times as far as Clare ran this
week. Clare ran 5 more miles this week than she did last week.

5.3: More Situations, Diagrams, and Equations

Each situation in the previous activity is represented by one of the equations.

•
•

1. Match each situation to an equation.

2. Find the solution to each equation. Use your diagrams to help you reason.
3. What does each solution tell you about its situation?

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Are you ready for more?

Han, his sister, his dad, and his grandmother step onto a crowded bus with only 3 open
seats for a 42-minute ride. They decide Han’s grandmother should sit for the entire ride.
Han, his sister, and his dad take turns sitting in the remaining two seats, and Han’s dad
sits 1.5 times as long as both Han and his sister. How many minutes did each one spend
sitting?

Lesson 5 Summary
Equations with parentheses can represent a variety of situations.
1. Lin volunteers at a hospital and is preparing toy baskets for children who are
patients. She adds 2 items to each basket, after which the supervisor’s list shows that
140 toys have been packed into a group of 10 baskets. Lin wants to know how many
toys were in each basket before she added the items.
2. A large store has the same number of workers on each of 2 teams to handle
different shifts. They decide to add 10 workers to each team, bringing the total
number of workers to 140. An executive at the company that runs this chain of
stores wants to know how many employees were in each team before the increase.

Each bag in the first story has an unknown number of toys, , that is increased by 2. Then
ten groups of give a total of 140 toys. An equation representing this situation is
. Since 10 times a number is 140, that number is 14, which is the total
number of items in each bag. Before Lin added the 2 items there were or 12 toys
in each bag.
The executive in the second story knows that the size of each team of employees has
been increased by 10. There are now 2 teams of each. An equation representing
this situation is . Since 2 times an amount is 140, that amount is 70, which
is the new size of each team. The value of is or 60. There were 60 employees on
each team before the increase.

My Reflections

Lesson 5: Reasoning about Equations and Tape Diagrams (Part 2)

• I can draw a tape diagram to represent a situation where there is more than one
copy of the same sum and explain what the parts of the diagram represent.
• I can find a solution to an equation by reasoning about a tape diagram or
about what value would make the equation true.

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Unit 2: Expressions, Equations, and Inequalities Lesson 5: Reasoning about Equations with Tape Diagrams 33
 GRADE 7 MATHEMATICS

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Lesson 5: Practice Problems

1. Here are some prices customers paid for different items at a farmer’s market.
Find the cost for 1 pound of each item.

a. $5 for 4 pounds of apples c. $8.25 for pounds of coffee beans

b. $3.50 for pound of cheese d. $6.75 for pounds of fudge
e. $5.50 for a pound pumpkin

2. Find the products.

a. c.
b. d.

3. Here are two stories:

◦ A family buys 6 tickets to a show. They also each spend $3 on a snack. They spend
$24 on the show.
◦ Diego has 24 ounces of juice. He pours equal amounts for each of his 3 friends, and
then adds 6 more ounces for each.

Here are two equations:

a. Which equation represents which story?

b. What does x represent in each equation?

c. Find the solution to each equation. Explain or show your reasoning.

d. What does each solution tell you about its situation?

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4. Here is a diagram and its corresponding equation. Find the solution to the equation
and explain your reasoning.

5. Below is a set of data about temperatures. The range of a set of data is the distance
between the lowest and highest value in the set. What is the range of these
temperatures?

6. A store is having a 25% off sale on all shirts. Show two different ways to calculate
the sale price for a shirt that normally costs $24.

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 GRADE 7 MATHEMATICS

Lesson 6: Distinguishing between Two Types of

Situations
Let’s think about equations with and without parentheses and the kinds of situations
they describe.

6.1: Which One Doesn’t Belong: Seeing Structure (OPTIONAL)

Which equation doesn’t belong?

6.2: Categories of Equations Card Sort (OPTIONAL)

Your teacher will give you a set of cards that show equations. Sort the cards into 2
categories of your choosing. Be prepared to explain the meaning of your
categories. Then, sort the cards into 2 categories in a different way.
Be prepared to explain the meaning of your new categories.

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6.3: Even More Situations, Diagrams, and Equations

Story 1: Lin had 90 flyers to hang up around the school. She gave 12 flyers to each of
three volunteers. Then she took the remaining flyers and divided them up equally
between the three volunteers.

Story 2: Lin had 90 flyers to hang up around the school. After giving the same number of
flyers to each of three volunteers, she had 12 left to hang up by herself.

1. Which diagram goes with which story? Be prepared to explain your reasoning.

2. In each diagram, what part of the story does the variable represent?

3. Write an equation corresponding to each story. If you get stuck, use the diagram.

4. Find the value of the variable in the story.

Are you ready for more?

A tutor is starting a business. In the first year, they start with 5 clients and charge $10 per
week for an hour of tutoring with each client. For each year following, they double the
number of clients and the number of hours each week. Each new client will be charged
150% of the charges of the clients from the previous year.

1. Organize the weekly earnings for each year in a table.

2. Assuming a full-time week is 40 hours per week, how many years will it take to reach
full time and how many new clients will be taken on that year?

3. After reaching full time, what is the tutor’s annual salary if they take 2 weeks of
vacation?

4. Is there another business model you’d recommend for the tutor? Explain your
reasoning.

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Lesson 6 Summary
In this unit, we encounter two main types of situations that can be represented with an
equation. Here is an example of each type:

1. After adding 8 students to each of 6 same-sized teams, there were 72 students

altogether.

2. After adding an 8-pound box of tennis rackets to a crate with 6 identical boxes of
ping pong paddles, the crate weighed 72 pounds.

The first situation has all equal parts, since additions are made to each team. An equation
that represents this situation is , where represents the original number of
students on each team. Eight students were added to each group, there are 6 groups,
and there are a total of 72 students.

In the second situation, there are 6 equal parts added to one other part. An equation that
represents this situation is , where represents the weight of a box of ping
pong paddles, there are 6 boxes of ping pong paddles, there is an additional box that
weighs 8 pounds, and the crate weighs 72 pounds altogether.

In the first situation, there were 6 equal groups, and 8 students added to each group.
.

In the second situation, there were 6 equal groups, but 8 more pounds in addition to
that. .

My Reflections

Lesson 6: Distinguishing between Two Types of Situations

• I understand the similarities and differences between the two main types of
equations we are studying in this unit.
• When I have a situation or a tape diagram, I can represent it with an equation.

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Unit 2: Expressions, Equations, and Inequalities Lesson 6: Distinguishing between Two Types of Situations 39
 GRADE 7 MATHEMATICS

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Lesson 6: Practice Problems

1. A school ordered 3 large boxes of board markers. After giving 15 markers to each
of 3 teachers, there were 90 markers left. The diagram represents the situation.
How many markers were originally in each box?

2. The diagram can be represented by the equation .

Explain where you can see the 6 in the diagram.

3. Elena walked 20 minutes more than Lin. Jada walked twice as long as Elena.
Jada walked for 90 minutes. The equation describes this situation.
Match each amount in the story with the expression that represents it.

A. The number of minutes

1.
that Jada walked

2.
B. The number of minutes
that Elena walked
3.

C. The number of minutes

4. 90
that Lin walked

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 GRADE 7 MATHEMATICS

4. Match each equation to a story. (Two of the stories match the same equation.)

1. Jada’s teacher fills a travel bag with 5 copies of a textbook. The

weight of the bag and books is 17 pounds. The empty travel
A.
bag weighs 3 pounds. How much does each book weigh?

B.
2. A piece of scenery for the school play is in the shape of a
5-foot-long rectangle. The designer decides to increase the
C.
length. There will be 3 identical rectangles with a total length
of 17 feet. By how much did the designer increase the length
D.
of each rectangle?

3. Elena spends $17 and buys a $3 book and a bookmark for

each of her 5 cousins. How much does each bookmark cost?

4. Noah packs up bags at the food pantry to deliver to families.

He packs 5 bags that weigh a total of 17 pounds. Each bag
contains 3 pounds of groceries and a packet of papers with
health-related information. How much does each packet of
papers weigh?

5. Andre has 3 times as many pencils as Noah and 5 pens. He

has 17 pens and pencils all together. How many pencils does
Noah have?

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Unit 2: Expressions, Equations, and Inequalities Lesson 6: Distinguishing between Two Types of Situations 42