Solving Word Problems in Science Name:___________________
Period #:___________________
These seven steps should set you up for correctly solving word problems in this, and hopefully
other classes. In this class, I expect you not to skip any steps.
1. Underling the variables and circle the values. (If there is no variable listed for a value,
write it in next to the number.)
2. Box the variable you are trying to find.
3. List the variables and values in a column.
4. Find and write the equation that has the variable you are looking for alone on one side
of the equal sign.
5. Plug in the values you know for the variables in the equation.
6. Solve the equation.
7. Circle your answer and check your units.
Let’s do an example:
A person with a mass of 75 kg is accelerated to 3 m/s2. How much force was applied to
him?
First we underline the variables and circle the values. Variables are components that can have
different values. In this example, the
variable
of mass has a
value
of 75 kg. So the problem
above would look like this:
A person with a mass of 75 kg is accelerated to 3 m/s2. How much force was applied to
him?
Now we put a box around the variable that we don’t have a value for:
A person with a mass of 75 kg is accelerated to 3 m/s2. How much force was applied to
him?
Now we list the variables and their values a column with a question mark for the value(s) we are
missing:
m= 75 kg
a= 3 m/s2
F=?
Our equation with F alone and both m and a in it is F=ma, so we write this down then plug in
values and solve.
m= 75 kg
a= 3 m/s2
F=?
F=ma
F=(75kg)(3 m/s2)
F=225 kgm/s2
F=225 N
That’s it! Use this method to solve the equations in the rest of this worksheet.
Here are the equations and values you might need:
F=ma a=F/m m=F/a agravity on earth=10m/s2
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