Simplifying Radicals

Before we officially begin our Quadratics Unit I do a little "mini-unit" where we build up our algebra skills. It was a bit alarming when we first worked with the common core and were developing our curriculum. No time was allotted to developing these algebra skills. It was assumed that students would seamlessly learn them while quadratics were being developed. Urp!  Much better to lay out these skills and then when we need them they are already in the student's toolbox of algebra for them to access (somewhat seamlessly). This mini-unit is divided into three sections.

1) Simplifying Radicals

2) Polynomials and Polynomial Operations (we skip division due to time constraints)

3) Factoring of Polynomials (we skip factoring by grouping)

So this blog post is on how we cover simplifying radicals. (topics 1 & 2 above were taught by my student teacher but I worked more closely with her on creating materials since I was finishing the unit with them).

Essentially we go over what it means for a radical to be in simplest form and then go over the process of simplifying, multiplying, dividing, rationalizing the denominator and adding/subtracting.

This could take a few blocks.

Then we summarize each process with this ISN page. This includes a cool foldable,

Introduction to Radicals (Algebra Foldable)

 that I had to purchase on teachers-pay-teachers from Lisa Davenport.

Sarah Hagan has some good simplifying radical ideas on her math=love page "Radical Radicals". I just wanted to have one summary booklet with all the techniques in one place, worth $3 I guess. 

Then the "right hand reflect" page has examples for students to complete.

Finally they have a packet of all kinds of problems to work on.