Algebra worksheet — GCSE Foundation

1.Amelia's mother is three times as old as Amelia. Four years ago her mother was five times as old as Amelia was then. Work out Amelia's age now.

2.Six years ago Harry was three times as old as his brother Leo. Harry is now 24 years old. Work out Leo's age now.

3.A rectangle has length k cm and width 5 cm less than its length. Write down an expression for the width of the rectangle, in cm.

4.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.

5.Look at the statement 2x + 5 = 17. Considering whether it is an expression, an equation, a formula, or an identity, which classification is correct?

6.A square tile has an area of 144 cm². Work out the side length of the tile.

7.A currency conversion graph shows that £4 is equivalent to 5 US dollars. Use this to work out how many US dollars are equivalent to £24.

8.A taxi fare, in pounds, for a journey of m miles is given by the formula F = 3 + 2.5m. A journey costs £15.50. Work out the distance travelled, m, by first rearranging the formula to make m the subject, then substituting F = 15.50.

9.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.

10.A recipe gives the cooking time, in minutes, for a chicken as T = 40m + 20, where m is the mass in kg. A chicken has a mass of 1.8 kg. Work out the cooking time in hours and minutes.

11.A stack of firewood has 3 logs in the top layer. Each layer below has 4 more logs than the layer above it. Work out the number of logs in the 6th layer from the top.

12.A taxi fare in pounds is given by F = 2.50 + 1.20m, where m is the number of miles travelled. Sam takes a taxi for a journey of 6 miles. Work out the fare.

13.The graph of y = x² − 2x − 8 takes these values: when x = −2, y = 0; when x = −1, y = −5; when x = 0, y = −8; when x = 3, y = −5; when x = 4, y = 0. Use these values to write down the two solutions of x² − 2x − 8 = 0.

14.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.

15.A hiker's distance-time graph shows the following: he walks 5 km in the first 1 hour at a steady speed, rests for 1 hour, then walks a further 9 km in the next 2 hours, also at a steady speed. Work out his average speed for the whole journey, in km/h.