Question

a group of students is working on using a scale to calculate the distances of different planets from the sun. however, they have made a mistake in their work. look at their data below. scale: 1 centimeter = 20 million kilometers
can you identify and correct the mistake?

planet	actual distance from sun (in millions of km)	scale distance from sun
planet b	100	10 cm
planet c	212	21.2 cm

the mistake is_
correct their mistake below.

Explanation:

Step1: Recall scale - distance formula

The scale is 1 cm = 20 million km. To find the scale - distance, we should divide the actual distance by 20 million km.

Step2: Analyze student work

The students seem to have divided by 10 million km instead of 20 million km. For example, for Planet A, actual distance = 48 million km. Correct scale - distance should be $\frac{48}{20}=2.4$ cm, but they got 4.8 cm.

Step3: Correct the calculations

For Planet A: $\frac{48}{20}=2.4$ cm.
For Planet B: $\frac{100}{20}=5$ cm.
For Planet C: $\frac{212}{20}=10.6$ cm.

Answer:

The students divided by 10 million km instead of 20 million km. The correct scale - distances are: Planet A: 2.4 cm, Planet B: 5 cm, Planet C: 10.6 cm.