Question: Judy is taking pictures of Jim, Karen and Mike. She asks them, " How many different ways could you three children stand in a line?"

Strategy:

1) UNDERSTAND:

What do you need to know?

You need to know that any of the students can be first, second or third.

2) PLAN:

How can you solve the problem?

You can make a list to help you find all the different ways. Choose one student to be first, and another to be second. The last one will be third.

3) SOLVE:

When you make your list, you will notice that there are 2 ways for Jim to be first, 2 ways for Karen to be first and 2 ways for Mike to be first.

First	Second	Third
Jim	Karen	Mike
Jim	Mike	Karen
Karen	Jim	Mike
Karen	Mike	Jim
Mike	Karen	Jim
Mike	Jim	Karen

So, there are 6 ways that the children could stand in line.