The Hungry Bookworm
My brother has written three books. The Collected Works of Thomas Q. Magliozzi, right. It's actually one book, which consists of three volumes while Volume One, Volume Two, and Volume Three.
They're on the shelf in order one, two, and three. Now a bookworm is going to eat its way from the first page of Volume One to the last page of Volume Three.
Now the pages of each of these volumes amount to three inches. So each volume has three inches of pages. And each cover is a quarter of an inch thick
He's gonna eat his wave from the first page of Volume One, the last page of Volume Three. And we want to know, the covers are a quarter of an inch thick. Each volume has three inches worth of pages. How many inches of material does this bookworm digest?
Now any fourth grader can figure this out. So if you have one, ask them!