Astudent solved this problem by working backwards.

joani has some stuffed animals. she has 2 times as many as lily. lily has 6 stuffed animals. joanie gave 2 away and bought 4 more. how many stuffed animals does joani have now?

students's solution: lily has 6 stuffed animals, so joani had 6 × 2 to begin with. so joani had 12 stuffed animals. she gave away 2, so 12 – 2 = 10. she bought 4, so 10 + 4 = 14. so joani has 14 stuffed animals.

here is another problem that can also be solved by working backwards.

wyatt has 3 times as many baseballs as golf balls. he has 5 fewer tennis balls than baseballs. wyatt has 4 golf balls.

how many tennis balls does wyatt have?