Answer this and then I'll tell you why I've asked it.

SEE how I got thrown out of maths?

I got thrown out of O level maths too KK - right at the last minute when it became obvious o the teacher I was going to fail (it had been obvious to me all along). I had to swap to the CSE class and catch up on the syllabus.

Got an "A" in A level English Lit though 

literatin wrote (see)

I got it right but didn't bother to dredge up my algebra skills (which I'm fairly sure I didn't have when I was 8!). Try this instead:

Pile 1 has 4 more coins than pile 2, so it has to have at least 4 coins in it. That would make it 4+0+1... oops, can't have 2x0, so that's not the answer and doesn't use all the coins anyway.

Try again with 5 coins in pile 1. 5+1+2+2 works okay except they don't add up to 20.

(By this point she'll probably be happy enough to skip stage 3..., but obvs it's 6+2+3+4=15)

Then try it with 7 coins in pile 1 and it works AND adds up to 20, so you can stop.

2x0=0. You can multiply by zero, but if you try to multiply by zero the world as we know it can fall apart!

well, okay, yes you can, but not if you want all your piles to have coins in. Otherwise she hasn't made four piles of coins. I should have started with at least one in pile 2 really.

Sorry to disappoint guys, kitten has been off school poorly for the last 2 days, and so missed the homework handed out yesterday.

Hope she's better soon, KK, and not just so we can all do her homework...

Thanks