Money is the topic area parents ask us about most, and it is the one that shows up everywhere in everyday and workplace maths — totalling a bill, working out change, reading a fare table, checking a discount, splitting a cost. Below are ten original money questions written in the style of the WPLN numeracy paper.
Tap the answer you think is right. If it's not, nothing bad happens — you can try again. Then open Show the working to see how it's solved step by step, and the mistake that question is designed to catch.
Jia Hui is given two $2 notes, three 50-cent coins and four 20-cent coins. How much money does she have altogether?
Work out each kind of money separately, then add the three totals.
Notes: $2 × 2 = $4.00
50-cent coins: $0.50 × 3 = $1.50
20-cent coins: $0.20 × 4 = $0.80
$4.00 + $1.50 + $0.80 = $6.30
Common slip: writing four 20-cent coins as $0.08 instead of $0.80. Say it out loud — "twenty cents, four times, is eighty cents" — before writing anything down.
Ravi buys a school shirt for $18.50 and a pair of socks for $4.25. He pays with a $50 note. How much change does he get?
Change questions are always two steps: total first, then subtract.
$18.50 + $4.25 = $22.75
$50.00 − $22.75 = $27.25
Common slip: stopping at $22.75 — that's the total spent, not the change. Underline the actual question before working it out.
Bus fares to the market:
| Adult | $1.85 |
|---|---|
| Student | $0.75 |
| Senior | $0.65 |
Mdm Tan is a senior. She travels with her grandson, who is a student. They both go to the market and come home again. How much do they pay in total?
Two people, two different rows, and each makes two journeys.
Mdm Tan (senior): $0.65 × 2 = $1.30
Grandson (student): $0.75 × 2 = $1.50
$1.30 + $1.50 = $2.80
Common slip: forgetting the journey home, which gives $1.40. Fare questions hide two traps at once — the wrong row, and the return trip. Ask "who is travelling?" and "how many journeys?" before touching the numbers.
Shop A sells 6 eggs for $2.40. Shop B sells 10 eggs for $3.50. Which shop is cheaper per egg, and by how much?
You can only compare fairly if you find the price of one egg in each shop.
Shop A: $2.40 ÷ 6 = $0.40 an egg
Shop B: $3.50 ÷ 10 = $0.35 an egg
$0.40 − $0.35 = Shop B is cheaper, by 5 cents an egg
Common slip: comparing the two prices on the label ($2.40 against $3.50) and picking Shop A because the number is smaller. Different pack sizes always have to be brought down to one item first.
A backpack costs $40. The shop takes 25% off. How much does the backpack cost now?
25% is the same as a quarter, so find a quarter of the price, then take it off.
25% of $40 = $40 ÷ 4 = $10 off
$40 − $10 = $30
Common slip: answering $10. That is how much you save, not how much you pay. Discount questions nearly always ask for the price after the discount — one extra subtraction that is easy to forget once the hard part is done.
Nurul has $20 to spend. Bubble tea costs $3.60 a cup. What is the largest number of cups she can buy, and how much money is left?
Count up in $3.60 until you would go past $20.
5 cups: $3.60 × 5 = $18.00 — still under $20 ✔
6 cups: $3.60 × 6 = $21.60 — too much ✘
So 5 cups, and $20.00 − $18.00 = $2.00 left.
5 cups, $2.00 left
Common slip: dividing $20 ÷ $3.60, getting 5.55, and rounding up to 6. With money you cannot buy part of a cup, and you can never round up past what you have — always round down.
Four friends share a meal. The bill comes to $46.00 and they split it equally. How much does each person pay?
Sharing equally means divide.
$46.00 ÷ 4
$40 ÷ 4 = $10, and $6 ÷ 4 = $1.50
$10 + $1.50 = $11.50
Common slip: writing $11.05 instead of $11.50. Half a dollar is 50 cents, not 5 cents — a place-value slip rather than a division mistake. Check the answer by multiplying back: $11.50 × 4 = $46.00 ✔
Hafiz has a weekend job that pays $9 an hour. He works 6 hours on Saturday and 4 hours on Sunday. How much does he earn that weekend?
Add the hours first, then multiply by the rate.
6 hours + 4 hours = 10 hours
10 × $9 = $90
Common slip: working out one day and forgetting the other ($54 or $36). Pay questions are the ones most worth practising out loud — "how many hours altogether, then how much per hour" — because they turn up in real payslips later.
A pair of work shoes costs $85. Siti has saved $47.50 so far. How much more does she need?
"How much more" means find the difference — subtract.
Write $85 as $85.00 so the decimal points line up.
$85.00 − $47.50 = $37.50
Check: $47.50 + $37.50 = $85.00 ✔
Common slip: adding, and answering $132.50. "How much more" sounds like it is asking for a bigger number, but it is always a subtraction. Checking by adding your answer back is the fastest way to catch it.
Three friends each buy one packet of chicken rice at $4.50 and one drink at $1.20. They pay together with a $20 note. How much change do they get?
Three steps. Take them one at a time.
Chicken rice: $4.50 × 3 = $13.50
Drinks: $1.20 × 3 = $3.60
Total: $13.50 + $3.60 = $17.10
Change: $20.00 − $17.10 = $2.90
Common slip: working out what one friend spends ($5.70) and taking that off $20, which gives $14.30. In a multi-step question, write each step on its own line — most errors here are lost track, not bad arithmetic.
Our free practice generates fresh money and change questions every session, with new numbers and contexts each time, and shows the working for every one. It's the same style as above, but it never runs out.
Practise money questions free 🚀If you only have time to work on one topic before the numeracy paper, money is usually the one to pick — for three practical reasons:
Across the questions above, nearly every wrong option is one of these four — and they are habits, not knowledge gaps, which is why practice fixes them so quickly:
Free daily WPLN numeracy practice — money, time, decimals, fractions and word problems, one gentle question at a time, with a parent progress view.
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