Chapter 5
Part 1: For the problem in the Teacher's Edition, page 108
Provide students with the Problem Worksheet (PDF file).
To find the average speed of the Concorde students need to divide 17,400 miles by 12. To find how many miles Amelia Earhart could have traveled in 12 hours, students need to find her average speed per hour by dividing 2,205 by 15. Then take the answer, 147, and multiply it by 12 to find how many miles Amelia Earhart could have traveled in 12 hours.
Answers:
The average speed of the Concorde was about 1,450 miles per hour (mi/h).
Amelia Earhart could have traveled about 1,764 miles in 12 hours.
Part 2: Be an Investigator
A good time to do this investigation is after Lesson 5 on division with greater numbers.
Introducing the Investigation
Introduce the investigation by reading aloud the assignment at the top of the first page of the Description of Investigation and Student Report (PDF file), by having one of your students read aloud the assignment, or by having the students read the assignment individually.
Ask, How would you find the average speed in miles per hour (mi/h) of one of these flights? (divide the distance by the amount of time)
Ask, Which average speed is not in terms of mi/h?(the Wright Brothers' average speed)
Doing the Investigation
Have students share both their solution and how they found it.
Answers for the Data Sheet
| Date | Name | Flight | Distance | Length of Time | Average Speed |
| December 17, 1903 | Wright Brothers | First flight | 120 feet | 12 seconds | about 7 mi/h |
| May 17, 1913 | Domingo Rosillo | First flight from Florida to Cuba | 90 miles | about 3 hours | about 30 mi/h |
| May 20, 1927 | Charles Lindbergh | New York to Paris | 3,610 miles | about 34 hours | about 106 mi/h |
| May 20, 1932 | Amelia Earhart | First solo flight across the Atlantic by a woman | 2,026 miles | about 15 hours | about 135 mi/h |
Student Report
The student report gives students an opportunity to show the results of the work they have done calculating the average speed of some famous flights.
Extending the Investigation
You might want to have the students use a calculator to calculate the average speed of the Wright Brothers flight in miles per hour. This would make it easier to compare their speed with the other speeds.
Answer:
To convert to find the average speed in hours rather than seconds, you would have to determine the number of seconds in an hour. There are 60 seconds in one minute and 60 minutes in an hour, so there are 60 × 60 or 3,600 seconds in an hour. 10 ft/s is multiplied by 
(which is equal to 1) in order to find the number of feet per hour (ft/h). This would be 
or 36,000 ft/h. To find the number of miles per hour (mi/h), divide 36,000 by the number of feet in a mile, 5,280. This is about 7 mi/h.