100 lbs Healthy Granola = 25 lbs of cashews
100 lbs Crunchy Granola = 30 lbs of cashews
100 lbs We’re Nuts! = 35 lbs of cashews
100 lbs Hola Granola = 20 lbs of cashews
The next piece is price. Add the price of 100 pounds of each granola to your scratch paper:
100 lbs Healthy Granola = 25 lbs of cashews = $400 total
100 lbs Crunchy Granola = 30 lbs of cashews = $540 total
100 lbs We’re Nuts! = 35 lbs of cashews = $700 total
100 lbs Hola Granola = 20 lbs of cashews = $500 total
With this information, you can start to figure out how much Vik is paying per pound of cashews.
Healthy Granola contains 25 lbs of cashews for $400. If you do the math, that is $400 ÷ 25 lbs cashews or
$16 per pound of cashews. Crunchy Granola costs $540 for 30 lbs of cashews or $540 ÷ 30 lbs cashews
= $18/lb cashews. Since this is more expensive, you can eliminate (B). This is not how Vik is going to get
the greatest amount of cashews per dollar. We’re Nuts!, besides having a great name, also has a really
high percentage of cashews. You might think that would be Vik’s best buy, but when you do the math, $700
for 35 lbs of cashews is $700 ÷ 35 lbs cashews or $20/lb cashews. This is less cashew per dollar than
(A), so eliminate (C). Hola Granola costs $500 for 20 lbs of cashews, and $500 ÷ 20 lbs cashews is
going to come out to a whopping $25/lb cashews. That is definitely not the best deal on cashews, so
eliminate (D).
Apparently, nothing is going to beat Healthy Granola in terms of the cashew content per dollar! You can
choose (A), and leave Vik to figure out what he is going to do with all that granola.
Meaning in Context
Some questions, instead of asking you to come up with an equation, just want you to recognize what a part
of the equation stands for. It sounds like a simple enough task, but when you look at the equation, they
have made it really hard to see what is going on. For this reason, Meaning in Context questions are a great
opportunity to plug in real numbers and start to see how the equation really works!
First things first, though, you want to think about your POOD: Does this question fit into your pacing
goals? It might take a bit of legwork to get an answer, and you may need that time to go collect points on
easier, quicker questions.
If this question does fit into your pacing plan, you should read carefully, label everything you can in the