Admission to a local aquarium is $10 for adults and $7 for children. The aquarium collected $6,459 from the sale of 783 tickets. How many children's tickets were sold?

1 Answer
Dec 12, 2016

There were 457 children tickets sold.

Explanation:

First, let's define our variables:

We can call the number of tickets for adults aa

We can call the number of tickets for children cc.

Now we can right two equations which we can then solve using substitution:

a + c = 783a+c=783

10a + 7c = 645910a+7c=6459

Step 1) Solve the first equation for aa:

a + c - c = 783 - ca+cc=783c

a = 783 - ca=783c

Step 2) Substitute 783 - c783c for aa in the second equation and solve for cc:

10(783 - c) + 7c = 645910(783c)+7c=6459

7830 - 10c + 7c = 6459783010c+7c=6459

7830 - 3c = 645978303c=6459

7830 - 7830 - 3c = 6459 - 7830783078303c=64597830

0 - 3c = -137103c=1371

-3c = -13713c=1371

(-3c)/(-3) = (-1371)/(-3)3c3=13713

c = 457c=457

Step 3) Substitute 457457 for cc for the solution to the equation in Step 1) and calculate aa:

a = 783 - 457a=783457

a = 326a=326