24 questions across ratio, direct and inverse proportion, compound measures and area and volume scale factors.
⚗️ Ratio and proportion mastery — Higher
Ratio, proportion and rates of change is 20% of a Higher paper and it is the area that rewards method over recall. This sheet works through it in one sitting: simplifying and sharing in a ratio, including the questions that give you one share or the difference rather than the total; expressing one quantity as a fraction or percentage of another; direct and inverse proportion, both numerically and as an equation with a constant k; compound measures — speed, density and pressure — with unit conversions built in rather than avoided; and the similar-shapes work where lengths, areas and volumes scale by the factor, its square and its cube. That last group is where Higher candidates lose the most marks in this area, so it is deliberately over-represented here.
- 1.Two investors put money into a business in the ratio 3:5. The first investor puts in £1,200. Work out the total amount invested by both investors.
- 2.Write 75p : £1.50 as a ratio of whole numbers in its simplest form.
- 3.A laptop priced at £520 is first increased by 15%, and then the new price is decreased by 20%. Work out the final price of the laptop.
- 4.Two mathematically similar triangular flags have areas in the ratio 4 : 25. The height of the smaller flag is 6 cm. Work out the height of the larger flag.
- 5.A printer prints at a constant rate. The time taken to print a batch of forms is inversely proportional to the printer's speed, in pages per minute. Printing at 20 pages per minute takes 15 minutes. Work out how long the same batch takes to print at 25 pages per minute. Give your answer in minutes.
- 6.Two quantities x and y are inversely proportional. When x = 2, the value of y is 15. Work out the value of y when x = 5.
- 7.Maya is paid £105.30 for working 9 hours. Work out her rate of pay, in £ per hour.
- 8.The rent on a flat increases by 10% one year and by a further 10% the following year. Work out the overall percentage increase over the two years.
- 9.It takes 2 identical pumps 10 hours to empty a flooded basement. Working at the same rate, work out how many hours 5 of these pumps would take to empty the same basement.
- 10.6 identical printers can print a batch of exam papers in 40 minutes, all working at the same rate. Working at the same rate, work out how many minutes 4 of these printers would take to print the same batch.
- 11.A mortar mix is made from sand and cement in the ratio 5 : 3. Write the ratio of sand to the total mix in its simplest form.
- 12.It takes 8 painters 6 days to paint a fence. Working at the same rate, work out how many days 4 painters would take to paint the same fence.
- 13.y is directly proportional to x. When x = 5, y = 18. Work out the value of y when x = 15.
- 14.A scale model of a shipping container is built at a scale of 1 : 30, using material with the same density as the real container. The model has a mass of 400 g. Work out the mass of the real container, giving your answer in kilograms.
- 15.Priya invests £750 in a savings account that pays simple interest. After 3 years, the account contains £840. Work out the annual rate of simple interest.
- 16.y is directly proportional to √x. When x = 25, y = 20. Construct the equation connecting x and y, then work out the value of x when y = 32.
- 17.In a school choir the ratio of boys to girls is 3:4. When 6 more boys join the choir, the ratio of boys to girls becomes 1:1. Work out how many girls are in the choir.
- 18.At an animal shelter, the ratio of cats to dogs is 2:5. There are 18 more dogs than cats. Work out the number of cats.
- 19.A cyclist rides 19.3 km in 47 minutes. Work out her average speed, in km/h, to 1 decimal place.
- 20.A toy manufacturer makes a model aircraft that is mathematically similar to the real aircraft, at a scale of 1 : 48. The wingspan of the model is 15 cm. Work out the wingspan of the real aircraft, giving your answer in metres.
- 21.The density of a type of wood is 0.8 g/cm³. Work out the mass of a piece of this wood with a volume of 150 cm³.
- 22.There are 400 students at a school. 25% of them have a brother, 40% have a sister and 15% have both a brother and a sister. Work out how many of the students have neither a brother nor a sister.
- 23.An amount of money is shared in the ratio 1:2:3. The largest share is £90 more than the smallest share. Work out the total amount that was shared.
- 24.A garden centre sells two mathematically similar sacks of grass seed. The amount of lawn a sack can treat is proportional to the volume of seed inside it. The smaller sack is 20 cm tall and treats a lawn of area 30 m². The larger sack is 40 cm tall. A gardener needs to treat a lawn with an area of 500 m² using only the larger sacks. Work out the minimum number of larger sacks needed.
What is on this worksheet?
The sheet holds 24 questions drawn from the MathsUK bank — the content area covered: Ratio, proportion and rates of change (statements R4, R5, R9, R10, R11, R12, R13). It is pitched at GCSE Higher and takes about 45 minutes to work through in full. It is built for independent practice, with full answers at the end for self-marking.
How to use the sheet well
- Print it or open it on screen — both work. Printing is A4; the screen view fits phones and tablets.
- Do all 24 questions before checking — about 45 minutes is the guide, but there is no time pressure.
- Check the answers — press “Show answers” or print the answer page separately.
- Redo the questions you got wrong — twice as effective as doing 24 fresh ones.
- “New questions” — builds a fresh sheet on the same statements, so you can practise again without repeats.
Why this sheet helps
MathsUK worksheets use questions graded by difficulty and a fair spread of correct-answer positions (the answer is not always (a)) — so the student really has to think about each question rather than guess a pattern. Every question is tagged to a DfE content statement and checked before it enters the bank. The answers come with a step-by-step explanation, not just a value — so a wrong answer becomes a lesson.
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