A student performs the following addition of fractions, 2/3 + 3/5 = 5/8. There is an error with the process the student used. What is the error and how can it be corrected? What would be the correct answer if the fractions were multiplied instead of added?

The error? The denominators can't be added. The student should have changed both fractions to equivalent fractions with a common denominator.

(2/3)(3/5) = 6/15 = 2/5

How come questions which were asked after others are being answered before the questions that were asked before them?? This is very frustrating when I asked my question hours ago which is still not answered and people who just asked their questions get answers within minutes

I didn't see the new questions you posted after your original question had been answered. Please post them as new questions.

http://www.jiskha.com/display.cgi?id=1391543994

The error made by the student while adding 2/3 and 3/5 is that they did not find a common denominator for the fractions before addition. To add fractions, it is necessary to have the same denominator.

To correct this error, the student should find a common denominator for 2/3 and 3/5. The common denominator can be obtained by finding the least common multiple (LCM) of the denominators 3 and 5. In this case, the LCM of 3 and 5 is 15.

To convert the fractions with different denominators to have the same denominator of 15, the student should multiply 2/3 by 5/5 and 3/5 by 3/3. This results in (2*5)/(3*5) + (3*3)/(3*5) = 10/15 + 9/15.

Now, the fractions have the same denominator, and the addition can be performed correctly: (10/15) + (9/15) = (10 + 9) / 15 = 19/15. However, note that 19/15 is an improper fraction, meaning the numerator is greater than the denominator.

To convert the improper fraction to a mixed number, it can be expressed as a whole number part and a proper fraction part. In this case, 19/15 can be written as 1 and 4/15. So, the corrected sum of 2/3 + 3/5 is 1 4/15.

If the fractions 2/3 and 3/5 were multiplied instead of added, the product would be (2/3) * (3/5) = (2*3) / (3*5) = 6/15. This fraction can also be simplified by dividing both the numerator and denominator by their greatest common divisor, which is 3. Thus, the simplified product is 2/5.