Ratio, proportion and rates of change worksheet — GCSE Higher

1.The price of a jacket increases by 50% and then decreases by 50%. Describe the overall change from the original price.

2.A spring's extension is directly proportional to the force applied to it. A force of 5 N produces an extension of 12 mm. Work out the extension produced by a force of 20 N.

3.A map's scale is given as '1 cm represents 2 km'. Write this scale in the form 1 : n.

4.A plumber charges a call-out fee plus an hourly rate. The total charge, C pounds, for a job lasting h hours is shown on a straight-line graph. The line passes through the points (2, 70) and (5, 130). Work out the call-out fee, in pounds.

5.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?

6.A car is bought for £12000. Its value falls by 15% in the first year and by 10% in each year after that. Work out the value of the car 3 years after it was bought.

7.A population of penguins on an island is 2400. The population is predicted to grow by 7% each year. Work out the predicted population after 2 years, to the nearest whole number.

8.An adult cinema ticket costs £15 and a child ticket costs £9. Write the ratio of the adult price to the child price in its simplest form.

9.£1 is worth 1.25 US dollars. Write the ratio of pounds to dollars in its simplest form, using whole numbers.

10.The mass of a length of copper pipe is proportional to its length. A pipe of length 4.5 m has a mass of 12.6 kg. Work out the mass of a pipe of the same type of length 9.5 m.

11.The volume of fuel remaining in a storage tank, in thousands of litres, is plotted against time, in hours, since a leak was detected. A tangent to the graph at t = 2 hours has gradient −8.75 thousand litres per hour. A tangent at t = 8 hours has gradient −3.5 thousand litres per hour. Work out by what factor the instantaneous rate of change is greater in size at t = 2 hours than at t = 8 hours.

12.A kettle uses 2.1 kWh of energy. A toaster uses 0.9 kWh of energy. Write the energy used by the kettle as a fraction of the energy used by the toaster, giving your answer in its simplest form.

13.In a class, 50% of the students study French, 30% study Spanish and the rest study German. Write down the ratio of French : Spanish : German students, in its simplest form.

14.A tangent to the graph of population against time at the point where t = 4 passes through (2, 180) and (6, 260). Work out the instantaneous rate of change of the population at t = 4, in people per year.

15.An ice-cream van's daily takings, in £, are modelled by a curve plotted against the average temperature that day, in °C. At a temperature of 22°C, the gradient of the tangent to this curve is 14. What does this gradient tell you about the takings at 22°C?