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Ruby Ruby Basics (Retired) Ruby Numbers Multiplication and Division

Set the variable quotient to be the result of dividing the product variable by 3.

I've gone over each video twice and read the transcript. I do not see where I was ever shown how to come up with the answer to this question.

variable.rb
a = 6
b = 2
product = a * b

4 Answers

Hi Sarah,

It is asking you to divide product by 3 and store the result in a variable called quotient. That looks like:

a = 6
b = 2
product = a * b
quotient = product / 3

Make sense?

Steve.

Thank you Steve. It makes more sense when it's worded clearly, such as the way that you put it, 'divide product by 3 and store the result in a variable called quotient'. I want to start a petition to word questions in all of the tests to be the same wording that's used in the videos. If the instructors would do this one thing, I'd save hours of banging my head against the wall.

The wording is a little opaque on that one, I'd agree.

This situation of writing test questions with different wording than what's verbalized in videos is throughout WordPress videos and I've caught it three times so far in the Ruby series. It's something that language teachers watch for when giving tests. It's also a rather side effect from being an expert in a certain field, which I've no doubt these teachers are. They know what they're talking about, but they aren't looking at it from the learners (and test takers') perspective.

I've done quite a few courses on here and must say that I haven't come across this too badly. Getting the language containing a consistent level and content, whilst maintaining the element of challenge, is a tough task and, given the wide reach of these courses, is pretty much impossible to achieve, I'd guess. There is the ability to leave comment & feedback at the end of each challenge. The Treehouse guys will act on input where possible.

I'm sorry to report, I come across it consistently. Writing/creating test questions that accurately communicate what's been taught is just good teaching. Assuming that a student who is new to said information to be familiar with other wording for a new process, other than what's been taught, is.. well.. as they say, 'assume' is to make an 'ass' out of 'u' and 'me'.