Happy Friday everyone! Let’s celebrate the end of the week by looking at a couple of math tricks to help your student through their math class.
If your student is in Algebra I, they have recently taken a test on factoring polynomials and quadratics. Even though this chapter may be coming to a close, this won’t be the last time they will need to factor polynomials. After Algebra I, students will need to be able to factor any equation that comes their way for the rest of their math career.
This is where many students begin to lose their confidence in math as they approach the start of their high school years. However, here is a trick that might help them out.
When looking at quadratics, the two most important numbers to look at would be the last term and the middle term when factoring. Let’s take x^2-4x+4 for example.
How to think of factoring quadratics is, “what factors of our last term will add together to make our middle term?” So, what are factors of 4 that add up to -4? This would be -2 and -2 since (-2)(-2) = 4 and (-2) + (-2) = -4. So the factors of x^2-4x+4 are (x-2) and (x-2).
This was just one example of many factorable equations your student will come across.
Come into Mathnasium of Huntington Beach for a free trial and see if we can help your student through the end of the school year and help prepare them for the next school year during the summer.
Phone: (657)203-2304
Email: [email protected]
(657) 203-2304
