Certainly! When we're solving a problem involving consecutive numbers, we're looking at numbers that follow each other in the natural number sequence. So, let's say we're determining two consecutive numbers which we'll call 'x' and 'x+1'.
Given that the sum of these two numbers is 49, we can set up the following equation to represent the situation:
x + (x + 1) = 49
Now, let's solve for 'x':
1. Combine like terms on the left side of the equation.
x + x + 1 = 49
2x + 1 = 49
2. To isolate the variable 'x', we'll need to get rid of the constant term '+1', so we'll subtract '1' from both sides of the equation.
2x + 1 - 1 = 49 - 1
2x = 48
3. Now, we have the term '2x', which means '2 times x'. To find 'x', we need to divide both sides of the equation by '2'.
(2x)/2 = 48/2
x = 24
We've determined that the first number, 'x', is 24.
4. Now, we need to determine the next consecutive number, which is x + 1.
Thus, we'll take our 'x' value and add '1' to it.
x + 1 = 24 + 1
x + 1 = 25
So, we've found that the two consecutive numbers are 24 and 25. Their sum indeed equals 49, as given by the problem statement:
24 + 25 = 49
Hence, the two consecutive numbers we were looking for are 24 and 25.
