Permutations

Hey everyone this is the one and only, Beyonce. Just kidding no it's Patrick.
Today's lesson was about Permutations.
Permutations is all about counting, without any real counting. Now what am I talking about? For example:

A cafe has a lunch special consisting of an egg or ham sandwich, milk, juice or coffee and a yogurt or pie for dessert. What are all the possible outcomes if you take one from each category?

It's easy to just list them all but there's a far more efficient way of doing things, using something called the "Fundemental Counting Principle," this principle involves reading word problems and translating them into a mathematical equation. Keywords such as "AND" or "BOTH" can translate into Multiplication while other words such as "OR," "EITHER" or "OPPOSITE" can translate to Addition. The question above we see that the word "OR" is present several times telling us to add the options for each category together:

2 Sandwiches, 3 Drinks and 2 Desserts.

The next step is to multiply each category to get the number of possible outcomes.

2 X 3 X 2 = 12

There are 12 possible meal combinations.

That's it! Make sure if you need any extra help or practice check out ther many examples in the booklet and ask for help! I hope this was helpful and good luck!

Patrick Eulalia