A pencil box has 5 fountain pens. 3 blue pencils. And 7 red pencils. One item is taken out of the box at random. Find the probability that the item is a:
fountain pen

Answer

To find the probability of randomly selecting a fountain pen from the pencil box, we can follow these steps:

### Step 1: Identify the number of each type of item in the pencil box.
- Fountain pens: 5
- Blue pencils: 3
- Red pencils: 7

### Step 2: Calculate the total number of items in the pencil box.
Total items = Number of fountain pens + Number of blue pencils + Number of red pencils
Total items = 5 + 3 + 7 = 15

### Step 3: Determine the number of favorable outcomes for selecting a fountain pen.
The number of favorable outcomes (fountain pens) = 5

### Step 4: Use the probability formula to find the probability of selecting a fountain pen.
Probability (P) = (Number of favorable outcomes) / (Total number of outcomes)
P(fountain pen) = Number of fountain pens / Total items
P(fountain pen) = 5 / 15

### Step 5: Simplify the fraction.
P(fountain pen) = 1 / 3

### Final Answer:
The probability that the item selected is a fountain pen is **1/3**.

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