Eli has 7 black pens and 5 blue pens in his desk drawer. He also has 3 yellow highlighters, 2 green highlighters, and 5 pink highlighters in his pencil case. If he chooses one pen and one highlighter without looking, what is the probability that he will get a black pen and he will not get a green highlighter?

Question

anonymous · Answer

@phi

phi · Answer

there are three steps to this problem.

First step:  what is the probability that he will get a black pen
The chance of getting a black pen is a ratio of # of black pens divided by the total number of pens.   
Can you figure out the probability of picking a black pen ?

Second step:  chance of NOT a green highlighter?   You want the ratio of not green divided by total number of highlighters.

Third step:  multiple the 2 ratios.

what do you get ?