​Emma is 14 feet from a gate, while Noah is 206 inches from it. Who is closer to the gate?

​If you were teaching your friend, what would you tell them to do first before solving this problem?

​Here is what we could tell them:

To find out who is closer, we’ll have to measure both distances with the same units. This means we can turn Emma’s distance from feet to inches or we can turn Noah’s distance from inches to feet.

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Some text here about the topic of discussion

​Now that we know we need to measure both distances from the same unit:

Let’s start with Emma. 14 feet equals how many inches? Feet is a larger unit than inches. That means if we’re moving from feet to inches, we’re going to need to​ do what?

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Feet is a larger unit than inches. That means if we’re moving from feet to inches, we’re going to need to multiply. We remember that one foot equals 12 inches. That means we need to multiply the 14 feet that Emma was standing away from the gate by 12 inches in every foot.

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If 14 feet equals 168 inches. Emma is standing 168 inches from the gate. Noah is standing 206 inches from the gate.

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​Let's go back to our original question: Who is closer to the gate?

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​Is there another way we could have solved this problem?