How to Solve Equations

How do I solve this equation?

Equations, equations, equations... they are one of the most important elements of math problems. We need them almost for everything, solving word problems, writing lines, geometry and more. Let's learn how to solve them. If you want to see this article as a video please visit www.I-hate-math.com

Thanks for learning...

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Difficulty:

Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need

• Pen
• Paper

1. How do I solve this equation?

   How do I solve this equation?. We need to solve for "X", this mean leave "X" alone.

2. Equations are formed by numbers, variables and an equal sign

   Let's remember that equations are formed by Numbers: 2,3,-3,0 etc.., variable(s): X, Y, Z, A, B etc. and an equal sign "="

3. Remember PEMDAS: Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally

   Since we have a parenthesis, we multiply "6 times X" and "6 times 9", getting as a result "6X + 54"

4. Grouping terms

   You have to group all your common terms from each side, as you can see, you can group (-54-5) that equals (-59).

5. Right and Left Side

   We have the right and the left side separated by the equal sign. It is very important to understand that anytime you move a number or a variable from one side to another (right to left or left to right) , you need to eliminate it by doing the opposite. If you are adding, you subtract, if you are subtracting you add, if you are multiplying you divide, and if you are dividing you multiply.

6. Moving your variables to the right side

   Let's move all the variables ( the numbers that have the X) to the left side. By subtracting 6X, you can move it from the right to the left.

7. Now your numbers!!

   Now you can worry about your numbers.

8. Almost there!!

   We can move -2 from the left to the right by adding 2 to both sides.

9. Let's divide -3

   Now we have that -3 is multiplying our variable, remember that we need to leave "X" alone so let's divide by
   -3 both sides (left and right)

10. (-57/-3) (A negative numerator and denominator)

    As you can see we since we have a negative numerator (-57) and denominator (-3), our answer is positive because (-) times (-) is (+)

11. Let's double check our answer!!!

    Our answer is X= 19, that means that when we plug 19 into our original equation, we will get the same number on the left and the right side.

    3X -2 = 6(X-9) -5
    3(19) -2 = 6(19-9) -5
    57 -2= 6(10) -5
    55= 60 -5
    55= 55

Tips & Warnings

• Make your own equations and practice, practice, practice

• If you want to see this article as a video please visit us at WWW.I-HATE-MATH.com

• Equations are very easy. Make sure you do not skip any steps, the majority of the mistakes students make is because they are careless when doing basic operations like adding, subtracting and others

• Always check your answer by plugging the result into the original equation

Resources

• I Hate Math Group, Inc