Introduction

For this unit in math class we’ve learnt all about polynomials and like terms, let me explain:

Like Terms

A “like term” is simply a group of terms that are alike, yet the coefficient (the number in the term) can be different such as:

And here’s some examples of terms that aren’t alike:

As you can see, sometimes it’s obvious when terms aren’t alike and other times it isn’t, because of the negative numbers, decimals and fractions that go along with the coefficient.

Polynomials

A polynomial is an mathematic expression that only includes addition subtraction and multiplication and they contain more than one term.

The Project

For this portion of the unit Mr. Gross gave us the opportunity to design our own project as long as we used the right polynomial and like term language, it had to be personalized and lastly it needed to be presented in front of the class, so I got to work.

I began to brainstorm and think about how I can make math the simplest and the most understandable and that is making a physical explanation, an interactive way of explaining the operations to people of all ages.

Supplies

• paper board
• paints
• small 1.5 x 2 inch wood pieces
• pen
• paper
• glue

The Process

I actually had most of the supplies already in my house so that was very helpful, but I did take a trip to michaels to pick up the paper board and began to paint. I mixed brown and white to create the background colour, waited for it to dry, then I put down green painters tape to make sure that the squares were straight, and began to add the colours.

 

Once I added colour to the board, I began to create the wooden tokens and the first step of doing that was drawing the design, I chose to make them all different fruits and that may seem like a random choice but it actually has a meaning behind it. The reasoning was that, the fruits that looked completely different from eachother such as a cherry and a banana were on the easy level because easier like terms and polynomials have terms that don’t look alike making it easier to tell if they are alike or not. On the other hand, the harder polynomials include the decimals and fractions, meaning that they are a little more complicated than the others causing it to be harder to tell which ones are like terms.

After I finished designing the fruits, I began to think how I wanted to make these tokens and since my dad is renovating our house he had a bunch of small 1.5 x 2 inch pieces of wood and they were thin enough to easy cut with clippers. I did the math and realized that I needed 48 tokens, 4 tokens for each type of fruit, I could get 3 tokens out of each piece of wood from by dad, so I got to work.

It wasn’t too long before I had all 48 tokens cut, then I realized that the edges of the wood ended up freying and they were a little rough so I used sandpaper to smooth out the edges, to make them better quality.

 

Once my tokens were ready, I began to cut the fruits out and glue them onto the wooden tokens with normal Elmer’s craft glue.

On the backs of each token I wrote their like term on the back with a black sharpie while counting them to make sure that I had the right amount on tokens and like terms.

Then, my project was finished for my Monday morning presentation. I’m very pleased with the results of my project, and I believe that it meets the expectations that Mr. Gross set out for us.

 

 

This project was quite enjoyable to create and I really liked having the opportunity to make up my own project outline.