I didn’t have a spectacular week on KA by any stretch, but I did achieve my goal of getting through one exercise and two unit tests. (Plus, I also watched three short videos. 💪🏼) The math was pretty straightforward but, just like five years ago, I got a handful of questions wrong because the phrasing of the questions confused me. Years ago, I remember being super frustrated trying to understand what the questions were asking and unfortunately nothing seems to have changed. BUT, I got through those tests and the exercise, so I’m happy to now be 97% of the way through Algebra 1. 😬

Here are two questions from the first unit test I did this week which was from the fourth unit in Algebra 1, Linear Equations & Graphs:

Question 1

This question was one that I didn’t have to think twice about. I knew that the function was linear since there was no exponent, trig operation, etc. I knew that if I switched it into y = mx + b I’d be able to determine where the line crossed the x- and y-axis. And I also knew that’s exactly what the x- and y-intercepts are: where a function crosses each axis. Even though this is grade-school math, it’s still a nice feeling knowing exactly what’s going on. 😤

Question 2

Again, this question is pretty obvious. The only reason why I added it here was because it was the last question I did on the unit test and I had forgotten to take screenshots of any other questions and I felt like I should at least add one more. 🤷🏻‍♂️

The next two videos were from the sixth unit, Systems of Equations, from the fourth section, Equivalent Systems of Equations:

Video 1 – Worked Example: Equivalent Systems of Equations

This video just showed how you can use LA row operations to manipulate systems of equations to switch up the rows. In it Sal talks about how you can add rows and multiply all terms in a row by a non-zero number.

Video 2 – Reasoning with Systems of Equations

This video also just talked about adding and subtracting rows, but it was fairly helpful for me. Sal made the point that given 2x + y = 8 (in the right corner of the screenshot), adding 8 + (-10) on the right side of the rows IS the same thing as adding (2x + y) to (-2x – 2y), because (2x + y) IS 8.

(That probably doesn’t make much sense, or maybe seems incredibly obvious, but for whatever reason, the way Sal phrased the concept of adding rows and why it’s “allowed” became super clear to me in this vid. 👍🏼)

The exercise I worked through this week was from the same section as the two videos above. The questions for the most part were all very straightforward. Here are three example questions from that exercise:

Question 3

Question 4

Question 5

I didn’t write any notes that felt worthy of adding to this post when I worked through this exercise, and I don’t have much to say about these questions now other than that they were basic LA operations but I sometimes had a hard time understanding the phrasing of the question and answers.

The unit test from Systems of Equations wasn’t too difficult. It was only ten questions long and all of the questions were pretty simple, especially after having gone through LA a few months ago. I only took screenshots of two questions:

Question 6

Question 7

My notes are messy but hopefully you can see that in this question I simply had to scale the first equation by six and then subtract the second equation from the first. Very simple row operations.

And that was it for this week. Not very difficult, so in retrospect I should have gotten more done, but I guess it could have gone worse. My not-so-great excuse is that my work schedule changed last week to working in the mornings and early afternoons so I have less time to work on KA when I normally do. And my other excuse is that I’ve been working a lot on CodaKaizen which has also taken time away from working on KA. In any case, this coming week I’m hoping to be able to get through two unit tests and two exercises. Again, this should be doable but it’s hard to say. I think I should be able to finish off Algebra 1 in two weeks at which point I’ll get started on Geometry (which I’m somehow only 81% of the way through 😒). I don’t think it’s likely that I’ll get through all the units by the end of the summer and the beginning of my seventh year, but I’ll try my best. Either way, the true finish line is getting closer! Hopefully I get there soon. 🤞🏼