Solve systems of equations by graphing
A system of linear equations contains two or more equations e.g. y=0.5x+2 and y=x-2. The solution of such a system is the ordered pair that is a solution to both equations. To solve a system of linear equations graphically we graph both equations in the same coordinate system. The solution to the system will be in the point where the two lines intersect.
Example
Graph the equations in a coordinate plane
The two lines intersect in (-3, -4) which is the solution to this system of equations.
Video lesson
http://www.virtualnerd.com/algebra-2/linear-systems/graphing/solve-by-graphing/equations-solution-by-graphing
Algebra 2
Operations on Polynomials
The definition of a polynomial is not easily explained because it involves several special terms. Knowing these terms is crucial.
Definition: A polynomial is an expression composed of coefficients and variables under addition, subtraction and multiplication and exponents on those variables must be non-negative integers. This table will help you discern the difference between polynomials and non-polynomials.
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When adding polynomials, like terms must be combined. For instance, 3c and 5c can be added to get 8c. Likewise, 3x2y and -7x2y can be added to get -4x2y. However, 5x3y and 10x2y5 cannot be added together because they do not have the same exact variables and the exact powers on those variables. Let those examples guide us regarding the following problem. On this next example, care has to be taken. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
When subtracting numbers, it is possible to change the problem to addition. Here is a case in point. Here is another problem, but this one is in vertical form. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
The best way to multiply polynomials is to do so using a visual organizer. We used a visual organizer in grammar school, called a multiplication table. That is exactly what needs to be used for polynomial multiplication. For example, we will multiply these binomials. [A binomial is a polynomial that has two-terms, bi–nomial.] For our next example, we will look at a much more difficult problem. We will multiply a binomial times a trinomial. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
We can combine polynomials by using the four operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division). This lesson will discuss how we add and subtract polynomials. The next lesson will show you how to multiply polynomials. You will learn how to divide polynomials in Unit 4.
The most important thing to remember when working with polynomials is that they are a group of numbers. This means that each polynomial needs to be in parentheses at the beginning of the problem. However, most of the time there are not a lot of like terms to combine within the parentheses. Therefore, after we combine all of the like terms within the parentheses, we need to get rid of the parentheses.
TASK: How do we get rid of parentheses?
Example: Find the sum of
The key word "sum" indicates that we have to add these two polynomials, so we can set up our problem like this:
Remember to put the parentheses because polynomials are a group!
Since there are no like terms inside each set of parentheses that we can combine, we have to use the distributive property to get rid of the parentheses. However, there's no number outside the parentheses for us to distribute.
TASK: When there's no number outside the parentheses for us to distribute, what number can we put there? Why does this work?
So we get:
When we distributed the positive 1s to both sets of parentheses, we got rid of the parentheses and everything else stayed the same. Then, we combined the like terms to get out answer.
Be careful when combining like terms because the signs of the numbers can get tricky. The easiest way to remember it is that whatever sign is in front of the term is the sign that goes with it. For example, in the problem above, we combine positive 9 and negative 12 to give us the negative 3 in the answer.
Subtracting polynomials is the same as adding polynomials, except there's one step that's a little trickier. Let's look at the same example from above, but instead of adding them, we're going to subtract them. We set up the problem like this:
We still have no numbers outside the parentheses, so we put the ones:
This is where the problem gets a little trickier because this time instead of distributing a positive 1 to each set of parentheses, we're distributing a positive 1 to the first set of parentheses, but a negative 1 to the second set of parentheses. This is going to change the signs of each term in the second polynomial. So we get:
Take a look at one more example. It follows the same steps, but it looks a little different:
TASK: Explain the steps done in the example problem above.