Santa claus is standing on the middle rung of a ladder. He climbs up 3 rungs and then climbs down 5 rungs. He then climbs 10 rungs to the top. How many rungs are on the ladder? How do you mathematically solve this problem?

Try to visualize the problem. If you are in the middle and climb up 3 stairs then down 5 stairs you are 2 stairs down from the middle. Now you climb up 10 stairs, so 2 stairs to the middle, then 8 stairs to the top from the middle. So there are a total of 16 stairs (8 * 2).