Professional Documents
Culture Documents
The Russian fourth grade textbook Mathematics: A Textbook for Grade 4 edited by A.I.
Markushevich, Ninth Edition, Moscow, 1980 was translated by UCSMP, and the translation is in their
archives. In this note we sample some of the key sections of this book and a number of the almost 1500
problems, many multi-part, that it contains. Our objective is to give a feel for the level of rigour, precision
and care with which the material is presented as well as the remarkable level of abstract reasoning that is
expected of the students. In this way we hope to give an idea of the level of problems and mathematical
material that fourth or fifth grade students are capable of handling. Of particular interest may be the
final section on more advanced problems from which we include a 20 problem sample.
Our discussion starts in Chapter 1, Section 9, Sets of Any Elements with sample problems.
135. There are 3 roads from Akulovo to Rybnitsa and 4 roads from Rybnitsa to Kitovo
(fig.45). How many ways can one travel from Akulovo to Kitovo by way of Rybnitsa?
136. One leg of a triangle is 3 decimeters, 6 cm long and another is 2 times longer. The
third leg is 4 decimeters, 2cm shorter than the sum of the other two sides. Find the
perimeter of the triangle.
3
137. A piece of a receipt from a store was accidentally torn off (fig.46.). Reconstruct the
receipt.
178. Can we compare numbers in which certain digits have been erased and replaced by
asterisks?
a) 72 and 75
b) 3 and 8
180. Find the three-digit number ending in 1 which is greater than 981.
186. Several 75 kopeck boxes of checkers were bought for a total of 9 rubles, 75 kopecks
and several 95 kopeck boxes of chess pieces were bought for a total of 6 rubles, 65
kopecks. How many more boxes of checkers than of chess pieces were bought?
194. A pair of shorts costs 1 ruble, 45 kopecks and a T-shirt costs 1 ruble, 25 kopecks.
Which costs more, 6 pairs of shorts or 8 T-shirts? How much more?
208. Solve the problems:
1) 24 tons of coal were delivered to a school. 3/4 of the coal was used over winter.
How much coal was left?
2) A painter use 4/5 of the paint he bought. How much paint was left if he bought
100kg?
222. Solve the problem: A vehicle transports a 3 ton load in one trip. How many tons
will the vehicle be able to transport in x trips if x equals 10 , 5, 0?
227. For which values of the variables are the following equations true:
a) x = 4941 198;
b) y = 37, 920/12.
240. Solve the problems:
1) A passenger train has 12 cars with 58 seats to a car. How many empty seats are
left if 667 people board the train?
2) An auditorium seats 360. How many empty seats are left after 8 classes with 41
children to a class take their seats in the auditorium?
Lesson on Expressions:
247. The distance between two towns is 512km. How fast must a train travel in order to
cover this distance in a hours? Write an expression and perform the operation for the
following values of a: 16, 8, 4, 2.
248. Daytime lasts a hours. How long does the night last? Write an expression. Give an
answer if a = 8, 10, 12.
249. x liters of milk were bought at 30 kopecks a liter and 3 liters of sunflower oil were
bought at y kopecks a liter. What do the following expressions refer to? a) 30x; b)
3y; c) x 3; d) y 30; e) 3y + 30x; f) y 30x.
250. Ivan Ivanovich left home on a fishing trip to Bear Lake. He traveled 3 hours by train
at a speed of 75km/hr. He then walked xkm. How far was the trip from home to
Bear Lake?
251. A man is x years old and his son is y years old. The man is 30 years older than his
son. Complete the following table:
x
y
x/y
32
40
45
30
How many times older was the man than his son when the boy was 1 year old, 5 years
old, 30 years old? How many times younger was the boy than his father when the
man was 32 years old, 35 years old, 45 years old?
260. I am thinking of a number. If it is increased by 15 and the result is multiplied by 8,
160 is obtained. What number am I thinking of?
6
Lesson on Equations:
415. The Ob River is 3,650km long, the Don is 1,870km, the Volga is 4,530km and the
Yenisei is 3,487km. Find the next higher and next lower approximations of the lengths
of these rivers that end in two zeros. Which approximation is closer to the length of
each river?
419. Some fishermen caught 240kg of fish. 5/24 of the fish were perch and 7/12 were pike.
Which did the fishermen catch less of, perch or pike?
434. Without adding, tell which sum is larger:
3,251 + 785 or 3.521 + 785
7,619 + 5,820 or 7,861 + 5,937.
436. Let A be the solution set to the inequality y 14/17. Which of the fractions 10/17,
14/17, and 16/17 belong to set A? Express in set notation.
444. Two trains set out at the same time from Moscow and Rostov-on-the-Don and headed
towards one another. The train from Moscow traveled at a speed of 65km/hr and the
8
train from Rostov-on-the-Don traveled 7km/hr more slowly. How many hours will
it take the trains to meet if the distance between Moscow and Rostov-on-the-Don is
1,230km?
454. One can travel by bus from Lidovo to Kuzminki with a change in Maryino or Sergeyevka
(fig. 131). Which route is better if we know that: the trip from Lidovo to Maryino
takes 1 hr. 48 min., from Lidovo to Sergeyevka 1 hr. 25min., and from Sergeyevka
to Kuzminki 1 hr. 35 min.? In Maryino there is a 5 min. wait for the bus, and in
Sergeyevka there is a 12 min. wait.
455. Segments AP and BM are equal (fig. 132). Are segments AM and BP equal?
469. A passer-by runs after his hat, which the wind carries away at a speed of 4m/sec.
How will the distance between the passer-by and his hat change if he runs at a speed
of 5m/sec.? How many seconds will it take him to reach his hat if they are now 9m
apart?
474. A tap which pours 30 liters of water a minute was turned on and in 5 minutes a
bathtub was filled. The tap was then turned off and the drain was opened. The tub
drained in 6 minutes. How many liters of water were drained per minute?
483. 3/17 of a vegetable garden is planted with cucumbers, 5/17 is planted with tomatoes,
and the rest of the garden is planted with potatoes. Which crop occupies the larger
area, cucumbers or tomatoes? What part of the garden is planted with potatoes?
492. Draw the diagram (fig. 146) in your notebook. Place numbers in the circles and
9
506. A truck left Leningrad for Moscow at 9 oclock in the morning at a speed of 48km/hr.
At 10 oclock a car left Moscow for Leningrad at a speed of 82km/hr. How far apart
were the car and the truck at 12 oclock on the same day if the distance between
Moscow and Leningrad is 650km?
518. Solve the problems:
1) 11 rubles 88 kopecks worth of sketchbooks and colored pencils were bought for
a group of kindergarten children. A sketchbook costs 30 kopecks and a box of
pencils costs 24 kopecks. How many children were there in the group if each
received one sketchbook and one box of pencils?
2) A childs suit costs 36 rubles and an adults suit costs 95 rubles. A store sold
1,517 rubles worth of suits. The same number of childrens suits and adults suite
were sold. How many childrens suits were sold?
541. Tolya began to read a book when Seryozha had already read 24 pages of the same
book. Will Tolya catch up to Seryozha in 5 days if he reads 18 pages a day and
Seryozha reads 12 pages a day?
563. Find the area of a square if the perimeter equals 72cm.
564. Find the perimeter of a square if the area equals 64cm2 .
572. Find the area of a rectangle with sides 3 times longer than the sides of a second
rectangle 16cm long and 12cm wide.
579. Write the following statements in the form of an equality and determine the values of
the variable for which the equality will be true:
1) the sum of x and 408 is 501 more than 312;
2) 700 is 398 more than the sum of 45 and y;
3) the difference of 145 and x is 533 less than 650;
4) 611 is 89 less than the difference of 800 and b.
588. The side of a square equals mcm. Write expressions for calculating the perimeter and
area of the square and find the values for m = 35, m = 105.
10
594. A collective farm raises cows, pigs, and sheep. The farm has 787 cows, x pigs, and
1,213 more sheep than pigs. How many cows and sheep together does the farm
have? Solve the problem. Find the value of the resulting expression for x = 1, 914,
x = 2, 213.
602. Apply the distributive law of multiplication:
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
(68 + x) 2
(m 7) 5
17 (14 a)
13 (2 + m)
4a + 4 13
f) 7m 7 20
g) 6 12 + 6x
h) 12 5 12x
i) 18k 9 3
j) 7p + 11p
d) (5 3)x = 5x 3x
e) (5 3)x 5x 3 2
f) (x + 2) 4 = 2 4 + 2 4?
612. A milk can contained 36 liters of milk. After 4 liters were poured into another milk
can, each can contained the same amount of milk. How much milk was there in the
other can originally?
A sample lesson:
11
647. A table is 9 times more expensive than a chair. Together they cost 40 rubles. How
much does the chair cost? How much less does the chair cost than the table?
650. In preparing a compound for polishing copper-ware, 10 parts water, 5 parts liquid
ammonia, and 2 parts chalk (by weight) are used. How many grams of each substance
must be used to prepare 390g of the compound?
654. In making cherry preserves , 3 parts sugar is used to 2 parts cherries (by weight).
What amount of sugar and cherries is used for preserves if 7kg 600 g more sugar is
used than cherries?
673. 11 parts water, 5 parts liquid ammonia, and 4 parts casein (by weight) are used to
make casein glue. How much glue is obtained if 60g less liquid ammonia than water
is used?
675. A library needs to have 1,800 books rebound. One shop can do the job in 3 days and
another can do the job in 6 days. How many days will it take both shops to rebind
all the books if the work simultaneously?
676. Replace the number 1,800 in problem 675 by 960. Solve the new problem. What can
you conclude?
685. Write an equation to solve the problems:
1) Michael has twice as many nuts as Nikolai, and Peter has 3 times as many nuts
as Nikolai. How many nuts does each have if they have 72 nuts in all?
12
2) Three girls collected 35 seashells on the beach. Galya found 4 times as many
shells as Masha, and Lena found twice as many shells as Masha. How many
shells did each girl find?
704. Perform the operations in the diagram (fig. 186) and explain the result.
713. Two teams of collective farm workers working together stored 1,200 t of silage. Each
day one team stored 40 t of silage and the other stored 35 t. How much silage did
each team store?
714. One worker worked 7 hours a day for 3 days and another worked 8 hours a day for 2
days. Together they produced 481 items. How many items did each worker produce
if both worked at the same rate of output?
716. Write an equation to solve the following problems:
a) A customer spent 4/5 of his money on a suit. How much money did the customer
have originally if the suit cost 60 rubles?
b) Before lunch 7/10 of the grain in a freight care was unloaded. How many tons of
grain were there originally in the freight car if 42 t were unloaded?
724. 36 students went to see a movie. This was 6/7 of the class. How many students were
there in the class?
725. The area of a rectangle is 616 cm2 and its length is 28 cm. Find the area of a square
with a perimeter equal to the perimeter of the rectangle.
Lesson on division with remainder:
13
14
15
808. A log 4 23 m long was sawed into pieces 13 m long. How many pieces were obtained?
812. Write an equation to solve the problem:
1) The perimeter of a rectangle is 42 cm. It is 6 times longer than it is wide. Find
the area of the rectangle.
2) A rectangle is 5 times longer than it is wide. Find the area of the rectangle if its
perimeter is 72 cm.
3
t
819. Some apples were delivered to a warehouse on two trucks. One truck carried 4 10
1
of apples and the other carried 1 10 t less. How many apples were delivered to the
warehouse?
821. A forester traveled 3 km on foot and rode 4 hours on horseback. What was the horses
speed if the entire distance covered was 34 km?
831. Compare:
a) 3/4 and 5/8 using parts of a circle;
16
852.
853.
868.
875.
883.
913.
916.
b)
12.21;
c)
3.343;
d)
9.1111?
924. Compare:
a) 3.573 and 3.581;
b) 8.605 and 8.59;
c) 7.299 and 7.3;
17
931. What numbers correspond to points A, B, C, D and K on the ray (fig. 213):
936. Petya had an equal number of beetles and spiders in his collection. The beetles and
spiders had a total of 308 legs. How many spiders and how many beetles were there
in Petyas collection.1
940. How many degrees does an angle contain if it forms:
a) 1/2 of a right angle
b) 1/3 of a right angle
c) 1/2 of a straight angle
d) 1/3 of a straight angle
947. Petya spent 1 hour 40 minutes doing his homework. It took him 1/5 of this time
to solve a problem and 1/4 of the remaining time to solve an equation. How many
minutes did it take Petya to solve the problem and the equation?
957. Solve the problems:
1) A large pair of scissors costs twice as much as a small pair. A small pair costs 80
kopecks less than a large pair. How much does each pair of scissors cost?
2) A rooster weighs 5 times less than a turkey, and the turkey weighs 8 kg more
than the rooster. How much does each bird weigh?
962. Volodya, Petya, and Tolya collected a total of 210 kg of paper for recycling. How
much paper did each collect if Petya collected twice as much as Volodya, and Tolya
collected twice as much as Petya?
1
Hint for U.S. students: Spiders have eight legs and beetles have six legs.
18
968. A parachutist fell for 4 seconds before opening his parachute. He fell 4.9 m the
first second, and each of the following seconds he fell 9.8 m further than he fell the
preceding second. How many meters did he fall in 4 seconds?
976. The first runner in a relay race ran 100 m in 10.2 seconds, the second ran 200 m
in 20.5 seconds, the third ran 400 m in 46.7 seconds and the fourth ran 800 m in 1
minute, 46.7 seconds. How long did it take the runners to run the entire distance?
What was the length of the race?
982. A bicyclists speed is 15 km/hr and a pedestrians speed is 9.7 km/hr less. At what
speed would they approach each other from opposite directions?
984. A river boats actual speed (in calm water) is 21.6 km/hr. The speed of the current
is 4.9 km/hr. Find the boats speed upstream and downstream.
993. Solve the equations:
a) 8.6 (x + 2.75) = 1.85;
b)
19
93 (71.8 y) = 22.48.
994. Write four numbers of which the first is 4.612 and each succeeding number is 2.154
greater than the preceding one.
1000. Without calculating, state which sum is greater:
a) 3.72 + 0.89 + 5.21 or 3.84 + 0.98 + 5.64
b) 21.4 + 8.3 + 6.1 or 20.7 + 8.1 + 5.73
20
1023 Using the variables x and y, write in general terms the commutative law of multiplication. Check it for:
a) x = 2.8, y = 1.05;
b)
x = 17, y = 0.17.
1024. Using the variables a, b, and c write in general terms the associative and distributive
laws. Check them for a = 8.5, b = 10, c = 0.2.
1026. Multiply:
a) 6.25 4.3;
h) 3.45 160;
b) 85 8.8;
i) 0.25 480;
c) 9.4 38;
j) 0.98 1.74;
d) 12.6 7.5;
k) 6.023 5.6;
e) 0.8 9.75
l) 3.4 18.478;
f) 250 2.31;
m) 2.749 0.48.
1036. Use the distributive law to find the value of the expressions:
a) 57.48 0.9093 + 42.52 0.9093;
21
1042.
1052.
1058.
1064.
1067.
1070.
c) 74 ;
d)
23
25 ;
e) 5 12 ;
3
f) 70 75
.
22
Lesson on percents:
A hundredth part of a ruble is called a kopeck, a hundredth part of a meter is called
a centimeter, and a hundredth part of a hectare is called an are.2 We often need to deal
with hundredth parts of various quantities: monetary sums, weight, volume, and so on.
In many cases a single word is used for a hundredth part - percent. Thus 1 kopeck is one
percent of a ruble, 1 cm is one percent of a meter, 1 are is one percent of a hectare, 5
percent of a ruble is 5 kopecks, 10 percent of a meter is 10 cm, 11 percent of a hectare is
11 ares.
A hundredth part is called a percent.
The word percent following a number expressed in digits is replaced by the symbol
% . For example the statement 1% of our schools Young Pioneers were sent to a rally,
2% of the area of the garden was sown with onion seed are read: One percent of our
schools Young Pioneers were sent to the rally; Two percent of the area of the garden
was sown with onion seed.
1139. 850 kg of cucumbers were delivered to a market stall. One customer bought 1% of the
cucumbers, and a second customer bought 3% . How many kilograms of cucumbers
did each customer buy?
1142. What percent of a number is half that number? one fourth that number? What
fraction of a number is 20% of that number?
1148. I was given 50 kopecks. I sent 76% of this money on food in the school snack bar,
and later spent the rest on ice cream. Hom much did the ice cream cost?
1170. 220 horses and colts were driven to a watering hole. The colts made up on 15% of
the herd. How many colts were there?
1174. When dried, mushrooms lose 79% of their weight. What amount of dried mushrooms
can be obtained from 20 kg of fresh mushrooms?
23
Decimal division:
1197. A mans stride is 0.8 m. How many strides must he make in order to walk a distance
of 100 m?
1198. The unit used in weighing gems is the karat. One karat equals 0.2052 g. Find the
weight in karats of a diamond weighing 0.7182 g.
1201. Find the root of the equation:
a) 1000 0.708p = 999.57166;
b) (x + 26.1)2.3 = 70.84l;
c) (x 1.2)/0.604 = 21.14;
d) (10.49 a)/4.02 = 0.805:
e) 8.2x 4.4x = 38.38;
f) 9a = 8.67a = 0.6699.
24
1205. How many kilograms less does 1 m3 of cork weigh than 1 m3 of water if 1 cm3 of
water weighs 1 g and 1 cm3 of cork weighs 0.22 g?
1217. A motorboat travels the 210-km distance between two river ports in 5 hours heading
downstream and in 6 hours heading upstream maintaining the same actual speed at
all times. Find the boats actual speed and the velocity of the current.
1227. A shipment of 24,000 bricks was delivered to a construction site. Breakage totaled
2.5% of the shipment. How many unbroken bricks were delivered to the construction
site?
1233. It is more than 10,000 km from Brest to Vladivostok. Will a map of the USSR, drawn
to a scale of 1:10,000,000 fit on a page in your notebook?
1285. Ice cream contains 14% sugar. How much ice cream is produced if 35 kg of sugar is
used?
1288. Three boys collected a sum of money and bought a soccer ball. One boy contributed
25% of the sum, another contributed 40%, and the third contributed the rest. The
first contributed 1 ruble. How much did the third boy contribute? How much did the
ball cost?
1302. A 5% saline solution is to be prepared. How much water and how much salt will it
take to produce 8 kg of solution?
1337. 3.4 kg of cookies and 0.85 kg of candy were bought for 7.14 rubles. What is the price
of 1 kg of cookies and 1 kg of candy if the cookies cost 2.5 times more than the candy?
1338. There were 3.2 t of rice at a warehouse. 80% of the rice was shipped to a store and to
a market. 1.28 t more rice was shipped to the store than to the market. How much
rice was shipped to the market?
1339. 1,030 kg of beef was delivered to a cafeteria. The beef contained 20.6% protein. How
many kilograms of protein did the beef contain?
1357. A rectangular parallelepiped is a cm long, 2 cm narrower than it is long, and 5 cm
high. Write an expression for the volume of the parallelepiped.
1360. When they were 600 m apart, Seryoxha set off on his bike to catch up with Natasha,
who was walking. In 4 minutes Seryozha caught up with Natasha. How fast was
Natasha walking if her speed was 4 times less than Seryozhas?
1368. A student spent 4 times longer preparing his lessons than watching cartoons on television. How long was the cartoon program if it was 30 minutes shorter than the
homework preparation?
1370. A book contains three stories. The first story is 4 times as long as the second, and
the third is twice as short as the first. How many pages long is the book if the second
story is 3 pages shorter than the third?
1374. A boy is 2/11 as old as his father and is sister is 5/11 as old as her father. How old
is the father if the combined age of the boy and the girl is 28?
1382. A father is 40 years old and his son is 5 years old. How many times older than his
son will the father be in two years? How much older than his son is the father now,
and ho much older than his son will he be in two years?
1388. If a certain number is decreased by 15% and then increased by 14% of the original
25
1440. The sum of two numbers equals 462. One of these ends in a zero. If this zero is
removed, we have the second number. What are these numbers?
1444. If a student buys 11 notebooks he will have 5 kopecks left. If he tries to buy 15, he
will be 7 kopecks short. How much money does he have?
1449. Two students each decided to buy a copy of the same book. One of the students was
1 kopeck short, and the other was 42 kopecks short. When they pooled their money
they still didnt have enough to buy even one copy of the book. How much did the
book cost?
1450. One casting yields 6 machine parts. The wast from 6 castings allows for one more
casting. How many machine parts can be produced from 36 castings?
27