Planning a Field Trip Using Proportional Reasoning

Congratulations! 🎉

Your 7th grade class is planning a field trip to the South Carolina Aquarium in Charleston. The principal has approved the trip — but only if your class can prove the trip stays within budget.

You and your class are now the official Budget Planning Committee. Using proportional reasoning, unit rates, and real-world math skills, you must determine whether the trip is affordable and how much each student must pay.

Will the trip happen?! Check out what we might see!  https://www.montereybayaquarium.org/animals/live-cams

Before you begin, review proportional reasoning concepts:

📘 Intro to Proportional Relationships? (Khan Academy)

https://www.khanacademy.org/math/cc-seventh-grade-math/cc-7th-ratio-proportion/cc-7th-proportional-rel/v/introduction-to-proportional-relationships

📺 Solving Proportions Video (Khan Academy)

https://www.khanacademy.org/math/get-ready-for-geometry/x8a652ce72bd83eb2:get-ready-for-congruence-similarity-and-triangle-trigonometry/x8a652ce72bd83eb2:solving-proportions/v/find-an-unknown-in-a-proportion

📘 Unit Rates Explained (Math is Fun)

https://www.mathsisfun.com/definitions/unit-rate.html

You must:

• Calculate transportation cost per student
• Calculate total ticket costs
• Calculate total lunch costs
• Determine total trip cost
• Determine how much each student must pay after the school contributes $500
• Decide whether the trip stays within a reasonable budget

🔎 Step 1: Gather the Facts

• 85 students attending

• 6 teachers (free admission for teachers)

• Charter bus cost: $1,680 total

• Aquarium ticket cost: $14.50 per student

• Lunch cost: $8.25 per student

• School contributes: $500

🚌 Step 2: Transportation

1. Find the cost per student for the charter bus.

2. Show your unit rate calculation.

Helpful resource on dividing decimals:

📘 Dividing Decimals (Math is Fun)

https://www.mathsisfun.com/dividing-decimals.html

🎟️ Step 3: Admission

3. Calculate the total cost of student tickets.

4. Write a proportion showing the relationship between number of students and total ticket cost.

Need help writing proportions?

📘 Writing Proportions (CK-12)

https://flexbooks.ck12.org/cbook/ck-12-middle-school-math-concepts-grade-7/section/5.9/primary/lesson/proportions-msm7/

🍽️ Step 4: Lunch

5. Calculate total lunch cost.

6. Find the combined cost per student (tickets + lunch + bus).

💰Step 5: Total Trip Budget

7. Add all trip costs together.

8. Subtract the school’s $500 contribution.

9. Determine how much each student must pay.

❓Step 6: Challenge Extension

If only 70 students attend:

• Recalculate the transportation cost per student.

• Does the price increase or decrease?

• Explain why proportional relationships change when quantities change.

Your project will be graded using the following rubric:

Great work, Budget Committee! 💼📊

You have used proportional reasoning to solve a real-world problem just like financial planners do every day.

Think about these reflection questions:

• Why is proportional reasoning important in budgeting?

• How did unit rates help simplify the problem?

• Would increasing the number of students always decrease cost per student? Why or why not?

Math is powerful because it helps us make informed decisions in real life — even about something as exciting as a field trip! 

This WebQuest was created for instructional purposes and aligns to:

South Carolina College- and Career-Ready Standard

7.PAFR.1.1 Apply proportional reasoning to solve problems in mathematical and real-world situations involving ratios and percentages.

Scenario Context

The field trip scenario is a fictionalized budgeting simulation created for classroom learning purposes. Ticket prices and costs may not reflect current real-world pricing and are used strictly for instructional design.