Exercise 2 Page 723

To add or subtract fractions, they need to have the same denominator.

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Practice makes perfect

When adding or subtracting fractions, they should have the same denominator. In this exercise, we have two fractions with different denominators. 7/12 - 5/8 To find the smallest common denominator we should rewrite the denominators of both fractions using only prime numbers. 12 &= 3* 2* 2 8 &= 2* 2* 2 Now, in order to get a common denominator we need to multiply each fraction by factors that appear only in the denominator of the other fraction. Therefore, we should multiply 712 by 2 and 58 by 3.

7/12-5/8

ExpandFrac

a/b=a * 2/b * 2

7* 2/12* 2-5/8

ExpandFrac

a/b=a * 3/b * 3

7* 2/12* 2-5* 3/8* 3

Multiply

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Now that we have a common denominator, we can proceed to simplifying the expression.

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SubFrac