human
Jason is tired of the neighborhood animals raiding his trash. He pepper-sprays some raccoons and 6 times as many squirrels. If he pepper-sprays 84 animals total, how many raccoons does he pepper-spray?
assistant
Define a variable ** Let r be the number of raccoons Jason pepper-sprays and s be the number of squirrels. We know that r + s = 84 and s = 6r.
Write an equation ** Substituting the second equation into the first equation, we get r + 6r = 84
Combine like terms ** Combining like terms, we get 7r = 84
Divide by 7 ** Dividing both sides by 7, we get r = 12
#### 12