The Department of Mathematics Education. EMAT 6700
J. Wilson
Math 1: Numbers and Operations
MM1N1
The student will
understand and use square roots of positive numbers.
The Pythagorean Theorem and the Area
of a Square are two topics that students have been exposed to
prior to 9th grade. In order to develop student's understanding
of square
roots, it is important to build on their prior experiences.
Below, we have described one method of constructing the square
root of a number. This will aid in student's understanding by
connecting to skills that are important in the real-world.
How to measure the square root
of a number that can be written as the sum of two squares:
Step 1: Express n as the sum of two squares
(i.e. 
or 
).
Step 2: On a coordinate grid, plot (a, 0) and
(a, b).
Step 3: Construct the segment from (a, 0) to
(a, b).
Note, this segment
has length 
.
Step 4: Construct a circle with the center
(0, 0) and radius of .
The point of intersection of the circle and
the x-axis is (, 0).
Consider the following example:
Step 1: 
Step 2:
Step 3:
Step 4:
Step 5: (red segment)
Return to Math
I objectives
This was designed by Scott Burrell and Kimberly
Young