ShmoopTube

Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.

Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos

CAHSEE Math 1.5 Number Sense 190 Views


Share It!


Description:

Number Sense: Drill Set 1, Problem 5. Which of the following is equivalent?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:03

Here's a boring, unshmoopy question you'll find on the exam...

00:06

Which of the following is equivalent to negative 3 times one-half minus one-third times 2 to the fourth?

00:14

And here are the potential answers...

00:18

Lots of curveballs being thrown at your head here.

00:20

You can either panic... Or you can just break the problem into smaller

00:23

parts and solve 'em one by one. Like this.

00:26

So... powers are top priority -- even ahead of multiplication and division...

00:30

...so let's get rid of that 'to the 4th' thing first.

00:34

Two times two is 4 times 2 is 8 times 2 is 16...

00:38

...so 2 to the 4th is 16. Onward and upward.

00:41

Now we should factor in the negative 3 so we can get rid of this set of parentheses.

00:45

And if we distribute that ugly negative 3

00:47

we get negative 3 times a half is negative 3 over 2 ... minus ... negative 3 over 3.

00:53

Luckily 3 over 3 is the same as 1 over 1... and since we're subtracting a negative,

00:57

we're really just adding a positive 1. We want our denominators to be the same, so

01:02

we'll rewrite 1 as 2 over 2...

01:04

...and adding them together we now have negative 3 over 2 plus

01:07

2 over 2 equals... negative one-half.

01:11

Let's not forget our 16... we still have

01:13

to find the product of that and our negative one-half...

01:16

Negative one-half times 16 equals negative sixteen halves... or negative 8.

01:21

Looks like our final answer is negative 8... which is option A.

01:25

So much prettier than what we started with. It's like we got a makeover.

Related Videos

SAT Math 4.3 Numbers and Operations
2174 Views

SAT Math 4.3 Numbers and Operations

CAHSEE Math 5.3 Algebra and Functions
2033 Views

CAHSEE Math: Algebra and Functions Drill 5, Problem 3. Solve the equation.

SAT Math 2.4 Numbers and Operations
384 Views

SAT Math 2.4 Numbers and Operations

SAT Math 3.4 Statistics and Probability
269 Views

SAT Math 3.4 Statistics and Probability

SAT Math 4.1 Numbers and Operations
230 Views

SAT Math 4.1 Numbers and Operations