Unit 6

Modeling & Translation

Turning words into equations; number/age/distance/value & relationship problems; intro scatter plots

This unit is about turning everyday situations into algebra. You'll learn to read a sentence in plain English, write it as an equation, and answer real questions with it. It helps to feel comfortable solving simple equations before you start, but the setup is the new part, and that's what we'll build here.

Up to now you've been handed equations and asked to solve them. This unit is about the step that comes before the solving: taking a situation written in plain English and turning it into symbols you can work with.

That turning-into-symbols is a skill of its own, and it's the part this unit teaches. The solving half you can already do. Once a sentence is in symbols, it's an equation like any other, solved the same way you've solved them before.

Before each new lesson, redo two or three problems from a lesson or two back from memory first. It's a small warm-up that pays off more than it looks like it should, and it keeps the solving steps from going rusty while you learn the new setup work.