Algebra worksheet — GCSE Foundation

1.Two brothers have ages that add up to 30. The elder brother is 6 years older than the younger brother. Work out the age of the younger brother.

2.A cinema sells adult tickets for £10 and child tickets for £6. A family group buys 9 tickets in total, spending £74. Work out how many adult tickets were bought.

3.A graph shows the total monthly cost of a mobile phone tariff against the number of minutes of calls. The line starts at £12 and stays level until 200 minutes, then rises by 5p for each further minute of calls. Use the graph to work out the total cost of a month in which 250 minutes of calls are made.

4.A taxi charges a fixed fee of £3 plus £2 for every mile travelled. The journey is m miles. Write down an expression for the total cost, in pounds.

5.A ball's height, h metres, t seconds after being thrown follows h = (t − 1)(9 − t). Given that the ball is at ground level at t = 1 and t = 9, work out at what time t the ball reaches its maximum height, using symmetry.

6.A ball is thrown in the air. Its height, h metres, above the ground after t seconds is given in this table: when t = 0, h = 0; when t = 1, h = 15; when t = 2, h = 20; when t = 3, h = 15; when t = 4, h = 0. Use the table to find the two times, in seconds, at which the ball is at ground level.

7.The graph of P = 480 ÷ V shows how the pressure, P pascals, of a gas depends on its volume, V cm³, at constant temperature. Use the relationship to work out the volume when the pressure is 32 pascals, and then work out by how much the volume increases when the pressure drops to 24 pascals.

8.The graph of W = 840 ÷ L shows how the width, W metres, of a rectangular field of area 840 m² depends on its length, L metres. Use the relationship to work out the width when the length is 35 m, and hence the perimeter of the field.

9.The braking distance of a car, in metres, is estimated using the formula d = 0.4v² + 6, where v is the speed in mph. A car travelling at 35 mph brakes. Work out the estimated braking distance.

10.Solve the inequality 6.3x + 1.8 ≤ 40. Hence write down the greatest number with exactly one decimal place that satisfies the inequality.

11.Work out the value of 3b − 4 when b = 6

12.A mobile phone tariff charges a fixed £15 plus 20p for every minute of calls made, so the total monthly charge, £C, for m minutes of calls is given by C = 15 + 0.2m. In a month where Ali's charge was £46.60, work out how many minutes of calls he made.

13.Explain why the equation 4x + 3 = 4x + 10 has no solution for x.

14.Ethan is 10 years old and his father is 40 years old. Work out how many years ago Ethan's father was seven times as old as Ethan.

15.Yuki is y years old. Her brother is 4 years younger than Yuki. Write down an expression, in terms of y, for the brother's age in 5 years' time.