Today, the first thing I heard as I walked into the classroom was something about dinosaurs and Jurassic Park. Apparently those topics will be brought up later in our...
NEW UNIT!!! Exponents and Logarithms ~!
First, we went into groups and with our brilliant minds thought up many ways to write numbers exponentially. The number 2 for example can be written as 2^1, 4^(1/2) and so on. Remember that there are an infinite number of ways to write a number.
Just a note! : Negative exponents give you the reciprocal of the base.
…and just to clarify the parts of a power so no one gets confused:
Now let us play the game that we all love to play: Solve for x!
Exponential equations are similar to what we have already done in the past, but now there is a new step: The powers that you are solving must have the same base because if the base is equal then the exponents must be the same. So if you don’t have the same base your answers going to be all wonky.
Some simple ones that we did today:
That seems easy enough right? But what if you have something like this?
You must still make the bases the same, but now we must take the exponents, turn it into an equation and solve for x. 
If any of you are wondering where the 6x-3=1 came from, please look at the exponents. Multiply 3(2x-1) and since the exponent on the 3 is a one then let the equation equal one and solve.
Then we did other practice problems that were similar to that one. Then the bell rang. :D
REMEMBER THAT TOMORROW IS OUR IDENTITIES TEST!!! STUDY! STUDY! STUDY!
The next scribe is Jennifer ;D
Hi Ann,
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the clear explanations; I particularly like the "anatomy of an exponent".
Best,
Lani