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Food Truck Festival Challenge

Posted on 2025-06-01

The Problem

Two food trucks are catering at a local festival.
Truck A can serve a full lunch to 160 people in 4 hours.
Truck B can serve the same number of people in 2.5 hours.
If they work together (at full speed), how long will it take them to serve 160 people?

Stretch my thinking...
What if there were 200 people? What about 500?
Enabling Prompts

For students who need help getting started:

  • How many people can Truck A serve in 1 hour? What about Truck B?
  • If both trucks work for 1 hour together, how many people would they serve in total?
Extending Prompts

For students ready to go deeper:

  • Is the combined time exactly half of Truck A's time? Why or why not?
  • If you added a third truck that could serve 160 people in 8 hours, would it make a big difference to the total time? Explain your reasoning.
Problem diagram

Student Solutions

See how our brilliant students approached this problem

E
Emma Chen
Age 11 • Riverside Primary School
Submitted 2025-06-01
Solution Approach:

First I found how many people each truck serves per hour. Truck A serves 160 ÷ 4 = 40 people per hour. Truck B serves 160 ÷ 2.5 = 64 people per hour. Together they serve 40 + 64 = 104 people per hour. So for 160 people: 160 ÷ 104 = about 1.54 hours or 1 hour and 32 minutes. For 200 people: 200 ÷ 104 = about 1.92 hours. For 500 people: 500 ÷ 104 = about 4.81 hours.

2025-06-01
M
Marcus Johnson
Age 12 • Oakwood Elementary
Submitted 2025-06-01
Solution Approach:

I used fractions to solve this. Truck A does 1/4 of the job per hour (because it takes 4 hours total). Truck B does 1/2.5 = 2/5 of the job per hour. Together: 1/4 + 2/5 = 5/20 + 8/20 = 13/20 of the job per hour. So they finish in 20/13 hours = about 1.54 hours for 160 people. I can use the same rate for other amounts.

2025-06-01
S
Sophia Rodriguez
Age 10 • Maple Leaf School
Submitted 2025-06-01
Solution Approach:

I made a table showing how many people each truck serves every 30 minutes. Truck A serves 20 people every 30 min, Truck B serves 32 people every 30 min. Together that's 52 people every 30 minutes. For 160 people: 160 ÷ 52 = about 3 periods of 30 minutes, so 1.5 hours. Then I calculated for 200 and 500 people the same way.

2025-06-01
G
Group
Age 12 • Maurice primary
Submitted 2025-06-08
Solution Approach:

See photo for working out

Working Out:
Student working
2025-06-08

4

Total Solutions

4

Students Participated

4

Schools Represented

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