On Monday Elisa paints 30 square feet of wall. She paints 2 x 30 square feet on Tuesday = 60 square feet of wall. On Wednesday Elisa paints 1 / 2 as many square feet as she painted on Monday, 1 / 2 x 30 square feet = 15 square feet of wall. In total, Elisa paints 30 + 60 + 15 = 105 square feet of wall.
The answer: 105
Reverse engineering the question: On Monday Elisa paints 30 square feet of her house's walls. On Tuesday she paints twice that amount. On Wednesday she finishes up by painting half as many square feet as she painted on Monday. How many square feet total does Elisa paint in her house?


Reasoning and answer: Every person needs 2 copies and there are 9 people in the meeting so she needs 2 * 9 = 18 copies. The contract is 20 pages long and she has to make 18 copies so she will end up copying 20 * 18 = 360 pages.
The answer: 360
What was the question?
Question: Sarah is in charge of making 2 copies of a contract for 9 people that will be in a meeting. The contract is 20 pages long. How many pages will Sarah copy?


Perry added 88 / 2 = 44 grams of fat to the recipe. Thus, he added 44 / 4 = 11 grams of fat to each serving of food.
The answer: 11
Reverse engineering the question: Perry made a recipe that serves four people. He added a half cup of cream at the end. Cream has 88 grams of fat per cup. How many grams of fat were added to each serving of food?


Reasoning and answer: Each person eats 3 slices of pizza, the group in total eats 18 x 3 = 54 slices. There are 54 slices in 54 / 9 = 6 pizzas.
The answer: 6
What was the question?
Question: There is a group of 18 people who are ordering pizza. If each person gets 3 slices and each pizza has 9 slices, how many pizzas should they order?


Maurice buys 4 * 5 = 20 pounds of ground beef. If 2 pounds of ground beef make a burger, then he can make 20 / 2 = 10 burgers. Given that Maurice will have 1 burger, he can invite 10 - 1 = 9 people.
The answer: 9
Reverse engineering the question: Since it is Maurice's turn to host this year’s neighborhood cookout, he goes to the local wholesale club to buy ground beef. The wholesale club sells ground beef in 5-pound packages. Maurice wants to make one 2-pound burger for each person that attends, so he purchases 4 packages of ground beef. How many people can Maurice invite to the cookout so that everybody, including himself, gets a burger?


Since there are 2 sets of 30 minutes in an hour, then in 8 hours there are 8 x 2 = 16 sets of 30 minutes. Hence, a machine that Sue oversees can produce 30 cans x 16 = 480 cans of soda in 8 hours.
The answer: 480
Reverse engineering the question:
Sue works in a factory and every 30 minutes, a machine she oversees produces 30 cans of soda. How many cans of soda can one machine produce in 8 hours?