GM Lesson 004 Hourly Wages

Learning Intentions

By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:

• Calculate wages from an hourly rate.
• Find total earnings from regular hours worked.
• Interpret hourly wage calculations using dollars and time units.

Prerequisites

Students should already be able to:

• Multiply decimals by whole numbers.
• Interpret money values written in dollars and cents.
• Convert simple time amounts, such as minutes hours.
• Understand that a rate compares two quantities with different units.

Key Idea Summary

Hourly wages are calculated by multiplying the hourly rate by the number of hours worked.

For example, if a person earns $245$ hours, then their total earnings are:

So they earn $120$.

The units are important:

Direct Instruction and Worked Examples

Time Allocation

Time Allocation

• Introduction, warmup and vocabulary: 5 minutes
• Direct instruction: 15 minutes
• Understanding checks: 5 minutes
• Exercises: 20 minutes
• Homework: 20 to 30 minutes outside the lesson it was taught in.

Link to original

Teacher Explanation

An hourly wage is a rate of pay measured in dollars per hour.

For regular hours:

where:

• is total earnings in dollars
• is the hourly rate in dollars per hour
• is the number of hours worked

When the number of hours includes part-hours, convert the time into decimal hours first.

Common conversions:

Worked Example 1: Whole Number of Hours

A retail assistant earns $267$ hours.

Find the total earnings.

The retail assistant earns $182$.

Worked Example 2: Several Days of Work

A student works the following regular hours during a week:

Day	Hours Worked
Monday
Wednesday
Saturday

The student earns $22.50$ per hour.

First find the total hours:

Then calculate total earnings:

The student earns $292.50$ for the week.

Worked Example 3: Hours and Minutes

A café worker earns $28530$ minutes.

Convert the time to hours:

Calculate total earnings:

The café worker earns $154$.

Worked Example 4: Finding Missing Hours

A worker earns $24 for a shift.

Find the number of hours worked.

The worker worked hours, or hours and minutes.

Understanding Checks

Check 1

A worker earns $ per hour and works hours.

Write the calculation needed to find their total earnings.

Check 2

A person works hours and minutes.

Write this time as a decimal number of hours.

Check 3

A casual employee earns $ per hour and works hours.

What units should the final answer use?

Check 4

A worker earns $ per hour.

Explain why multiplying by the number of hours gives total earnings.

Exercises

Simple Familiar Exercises

Exercise 1

Calculate the total earnings for a worker earning $ per hour for hours.

Exercise 2

Calculate the total earnings for a worker earning $ per hour for hours.

Exercise 3

Calculate the total earnings for a worker earning $ per hour for hours.

Exercise 4

A student earns $ per hour and works hours on Monday and hours on Tuesday.

Find the total earnings.

Exercise 5

Convert each time into decimal hours.

a. hours and minutes

b. hours and minutes

c. hours and minutes

Complex Familiar Exercises

Exercise 6

A café worker earns $ per hour and works hours.

Find the total earnings.

Exercise 7

A tutor earns $ per hour.

They work for hours with one student and hours with another student.

Find their total earnings.

Exercise 8

A worker earns $ per hour.

They work:

Day	Hours Worked
Monday
Tuesday
Thursday
Friday

Find the total earnings for the week.

Exercise 9

A cleaner earns $ per hour.

They are paid $ for one job.

Find the number of hours worked.

Exercise 10

A casual employee earns $ per hour and works hours and minutes.

Find the total earnings.

Homework Problems

Problem 1

Calculate the total earnings for a worker earning $ per hour for hours.

Problem 2

A student earns $ per hour.

They work hours on Friday and hours on Saturday.

Find their total earnings.

Problem 3

Convert each time into decimal hours.

a. hours and minutes

b. hours and minutes

c. hours and minutes

Problem 4

A worker earns $ per hour and works hours.

Find their total earnings.

Problem 5

A worker earns $ per hour and is paid $ .

Find the number of hours worked.

Problem 6

A casual employee earns $ per hour.

They work:

Day	Hours Worked
Monday
Wednesday
Friday

Find the total earnings for the week.

Problem 7

A worker earns $ per hour.

They want to earn at least $ .

Find the minimum number of hours they need to work.

Problem 8

A gardener works from am to pm and earns $ per hour.

Find the total earnings for the job.

Next: GM Lesson 005 Overtime and Allowances