the inside of the book shelf is 59in high. the five shelves in it are equally spaced and each shelf is 1in thick. what is the tallest book you can put on a shelf?
With there being 5 shelves in the bookcase and each one taking up an inch of space inside the bookcase, there are 54 inches of space available. (59 - 5 = 54)
This number is the amount of available shelf space to put books. With 5 shelves, there are 6 spaces to put books. Divide the amount of available shelf space by the number of spaces:
54 / 6 = 9 inches for each space
It would probably be helpful to draw a picture at this point to better understand the problem better; in the drawing, it is clear that the tallest book you can put on a shelf is 9 inches high.
To find out the tallest book you can put on a shelf, we need to calculate the available space on each shelf after accounting for the shelf thickness and the total height of the bookshelf.
Step 1: Calculate the total available space for the books:
Total height of the bookshelf = 59 inches
Total thickness of all shelves = 1 inch/shelf * 5 shelves = 5 inches
Available space for books = Total height of the bookshelf - Total thickness of all shelves
= 59 inches - 5 inches
= 54 inches
Step 2: Divide the available space for books by the number of shelves to find the maximum height of each shelf:
Maximum height per shelf = Available space for books / number of shelves
= 54 inches / 5 shelves
≈ 10.8 inches
Therefore, the tallest book you can put on a shelf would be approximately 10.8 inches.