standard_description: Perform operations with numbers expressed in scientific notation, including problems where both decimal and scientific notation are used. Use scientific notation and choose units of appropriate size for measurements of very large or very small quantities (e.g., use millimeters per year for seafloor spreading). Interpret scientific notation that has been generated by technology.
problem_activity: Warm-up
Students reflect on equivalent expressions that represent the area of a shaded rectangle which is part of a larger rectangle of unknown width.
Launch
Allow students 2 minutes of quiet work time, followed by a whole-class discussion.
Student Facing
A rectangle with dimensions 6 cm and
\(w\)
cm is partitioned into two smaller rectangles.
Explain why each of these expressions represents the area, in cm
2
, of the shaded region.
\(6w-24\)
\(6(w-4)\)
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Student Response
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Activity Synthesis
Ask students to share their reasoning.
\(6w-24\)
should be straighforward: the area of the entire rectangle is
\(6w\)
, and the area of the unshaded portion is
\(6 \boldcdot 4\)
or 24, so the area of the shaded portion is
\(6w-24\)
.
Students may have more trouble with
\(6(w-4)\)
. The key is to understand that the longer side of the shaded portion can be represented by
\(w-4\)
.
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aligns: no