If there are 36 buttons in a jar and there are 3 times as many white buttons than red, how many of each are in the jar? What is the equation and how do I solve?

R = red buttons

R + 3R = 36
4R = 36
R = 36/4
R = 9

To solve this problem, let's set up an equation. Let's represent the number of red buttons as "r", and the number of white buttons as "w". We know that there are 36 buttons in total, so we can write the equation:

r + w = 36

We are also given that there are 3 times as many white buttons as red buttons. So we can write another equation:

w = 3r

Now we have two equations with two variables. We can solve this system of equations using substitution or elimination.

Substitution method:
We can substitute the value of "w" from the second equation into the first equation, like this:

r + (3r) = 36

Now we can simplify the equation:

4r = 36

Dividing both sides by 4, we get:

r = 36/4 = 9

Now we can substitute this value back into one of the original equations to solve for "w". Let's use the second equation:

w = 3 * 9 = 27

So there are 9 red buttons and 27 white buttons in the jar.

To summarize:
- Set up the equations:
r + w = 36
w = 3r
- Solve the system of equations using substitution or elimination method.
- Substitute the known value back to find the other variable.
- The solution is r = 9 (red buttons) and w = 27 (white buttons).