Multiplying and Dividing Integers Activity

Wednesday, September 05, 2012 6:56 PM

As you can see above, there are three sets of negative two. The problem that we are trying to solve is -2 -2 -2. The trick to multiplying integers in this situation is that if there is an even number of negative signs, the answer will be positive. If there is an odd number of negative signs, the answer will be odd. So, this answer will be odd since there are three negative signs, which is an odd number. All you have to do now is multiply 2 2 2 regularly then add the negative sign to the beginning. After you have done all this, you should get an answer of -6.

Now the problem is -2 / -2 / -2. You will do the same thing as you did with multiplication. Since there is an odd number of negative signs (3), the answer will be negative. Now all you have to do is 2 / 2 / 2 regularly. When you do that, you get 0.5. So now, all you do is add a negative sign to the front, and you have your answer, -0.5.

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Now, the problem is -3 -3. Again, do the same thing and you will find out that your answer should be an even number. So, now all you have to do is 3 3 regularly and you will get 9. Since your answer will be positive, the answer is 9.

This problem is -4 / -2. Again, this had an even amount of negative signs, so the answer will be positive. So all you have to do now, is multiply regularly, and the answer to this problem will be 2.

Reflection: I noticed that this trick works when multiplying and diving integers (when there are only two numbers in the problem): - - +. As you can see, this is two negative signs, and one positive sign. If you had a question with two negative signs, you would just cover up the two negative signs, and the only thing showing would be the positive sign, so your answer would be positive.

This problem is -4 -4. Again, there is an even amount of negative signs, so the answer will be positive. So when you multiply regularly, the answer will be 16.

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This problem is -5 -3. Again, there is an even amount of negative signs, so the answer will be positive. So when you multiply regularly, the answer will be 15.

The next problem is -6 / -2. Since there is an even amount of negative signs, the answer will be positive. So when you divide regularly, the answer will be 2.

The next problem is -4 / -4. Since there is an even amount of negative signs, the answer will be positive. So when you divide regularly, the answer will be 1. Reflection: I noticed that when multiplying and dividing integers, it is pretty much like regularly multiplying and dividing (as long as you know the "tricks").

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