Question

8/3 - 4/10 = ?

Answer 1

To subtract factions from one another, they must have common denominators (this basically just means their denominators have to be the same number.) The two denominators here are 3 and 10. To make it so we can subtract these from each other, we need a least common denominator. (In most cases, we can find it by multiplying the two numbers together. However, in this case, we can make the two numbers 5 and 3 since the second term can simply. You'll see what I mean in a bit.)

So, let's do just that with the first term; we can multiply the first term (8/3) by (5/5), which equals 1, right? And anything times 1 is still itself. So (8/3) * (5/5)= 40/15. Let's repeat the same process for the term on the right, except this time we should multiply by (3/3). Also don't forget (4/10) can simplify to (2/5). So (2/5) * (3/3) = 6/15.

So we can rewrite the problem as (40/15) - (6/15) =?