Ahhhh....summer holidays

Hello everyone...

Well as you can see by the post history June was a busy month without much of a chance to do any posting.

I'll take this opportunity to wish everyone a great summer holiday, and if...for some reason you happen to stop by the site over the summer, leave us a note to say hi.

I'd also like to congratulate our grads on a job well done and thank everyone once more for the card, and the pen. It meant a great deal. Thank you very much. I've hung your 'tile' in the room by the window for all to see. Now others can ask about the class of 07.

Good luck, and for those returning in the fall...see you in September. Have a great summer.

Some Practice with Rational Functions

This is my first attempt at fading things in and out between frames...it's a little tricky. I know I need to make the images bigger, and I'll be adding some narration in the future. Any other ideas?

Uses of Radiation

OK...so to save you some 'google' time I found a quick list of uses of radiation along with a brief description too...

In case you're curious, this LINK may prove interesting study material. I'm wishing I had found it earlier (sigh).

Study hard.

Some more practice?

This link will take you to some practice exams posted for New York State. Many of the questions are similar, but there are differences in our curricula so not all of the questions you find here will apply to us; nor will the questions you find, be an exhaustive list of what you'll be asked to do.

To find questions on magnetism you'll need to look at the older exams.

Today in Math 9...

Today we discussed how a mind map (converted to an outline) can help us organize information. When information is organized it's easier to find at times like tests and quizzes.

We also practiced finding the areas of compound shapes and practiced showing our work to 'communicate what we understand'.

Using the Factor Theorem (effectively)

In the last few days we've been working on a way to factor large polynomial functions (finding their zeroes) without having to guess and check and then divide.

The remainder theroem lets us determine the remainder of a division without dividing. We substitute the zero of the divisor (the value of the binomial we want to check as a factor which makes the binomial equal to zero) into the polynomial. The value of the polynomial is the remainder of the division.

The factor theroem is an extension of this idea simply because if we happen to find a value that makes the function produce a zero remainder, we know that the binomial whose zero is that value, is a factor of the polynomial.

Take a look at the examples in your module (they are particularly good for this one). The link above will take you to today's notes where we discussed how to move from guess and check, to a more efficient way of guessing at zeroes of these elusive polynomial functions.

Some thoughts on Escape Velocity...

If you follow the link above it will take you to a fairly straight forward description of how an escape velocity is calculated. It is important to note that it depends on the mass and radius of the planet you are attempting to leave (Wikipedia refers to the value of 'r' as the height from which you are trying to escape-which for our purposes will usually be the surface of the planet).

If you don't like the Wikipedia article I did a quick set of notes HERE