Ratio, proportion and rates of change worksheet — GCSE Higher

1.A curve has equation y = x² + 2x. Work out the average rate of change of y with respect to x over the interval from x = 1 to x = 4.

2.A furniture designer makes a scale model of a wardrobe using a scale of 1 : 8. The real wardrobe is 2.4 m tall and 1.2 m wide. Work out the perimeter of the front face of the model wardrobe, in centimetres.

3.The total cost, in pounds, of manufacturing a batch of components is plotted against the number of components produced. A tangent to this graph at a particular point has gradient 3.60. What does the value 3.60 represent?

4.Maya buys a vintage car for £15000. Its value is expected to increase by 4% each year for 2 years. She then plans to sell the car and use £2000 of the money from the sale to buy a trailer. Work out how much money she will have left after selling the car and buying the trailer.

5.A recipe for 8 muffins needs 200 g of sugar. Sam wants to make 20 muffins for a bake sale, and he already has 350 g of sugar. Work out how many more grams of sugar he needs to buy.

6.A laptop costs £800 when new. Its value decreases by 25% of its value at the start of each year. Work out how much value the laptop loses in the second year.

7.The exchange rate is £1 = 1.28 US dollars. Convert £350 into US dollars.

8.The depth of water in a tank, in cm, is recorded every 10 seconds: at t = 10, depth = 32; at t = 20, depth = 45; at t = 30, depth = 56. Use the most appropriate chord from these readings to estimate the instantaneous rate of change of depth at t = 20.

9.The concentration of a pollutant in a lake, in arbitrary units, follows the recurrence C_{n+1} = 0.75C_n + 40, with C_0 = 500: each week, 25% of the pollutant breaks down naturally, and then a further 40 units enter the lake from run-off. An ecologist classifies the lake as safe once C_n first drops below 300. Find the first whole number of weeks after which the lake is safe.

10.A savings account pays 3.5% compound interest each year. Bilal invests £1200. Work out how much interest, in total, he earns after 2 years, to the nearest penny.

11.A cartographer is choosing a scale for a map to show a small park in as much detail as possible. Which of these scales would show the MOST detail — 1 : 500, 1 : 5000, or 1 : 50 000? Give the correct scale and reason.

12.A smoothie recipe combines 350 cm³ of mango juice with 650 cm³ of orange juice. Work out the total volume of the smoothie in litres.

13.For the pairs x = 6, y = 15 and x = 10, y = 25, which statement is correct?

14.A train travels at a constant speed of 90 km/h. Work out the speed in m/s.

15.Paint costs £14.40 for every 20 m² of wall it covers. Assuming the same rate, work out the cost of the paint needed to cover 56 m² of wall.