Question

Melissa puts 2/5 of her babysitting money in savings and uses 1/2 of the remaining money to go to the movies. If she has $12 left, how much did she have at first?

Answer 1

1/2 for the movies the other 1/2 is the $12
12×2=24
$24 is 3/5 of her babysitting money
24/3=8
$8 is 1/5 of her babysitting money
8×5=40
Solution: She had $40 at first

Answer 2

If you work backwards, she had 24 before going to the movies. This is 3/5 of what she had originally. Use this to find 1/5 the but dividing 24 by 4 = 8 then multiply by 5 to get back to the original value 8 x 5 = 40