Nine more than a number is equal to the difference of the number and six

Answer 1

Hi Shaniya,

You asked about the following:

Nine more than a number is equal to the difference of a number and six.

Whenever we see "a number," let's write that as the variable n.

"Nine more than a number" is pretty simple to represent mathematically. We'll write that as 9+n.

"Is equal to" is also easy to translate into mathematical symbols. Now we have 9+n =

"The difference of a number and six" is slightly trickier to translate into mathematical symbols, but not too much. We know that "difference" indicates subtraction, so this would be 6-n. Therefore, the entire equation reads:

9+n = 6-n

You might interpret "the difference of a number and six" as n-6. If, however, you were to write your equation with this expression, you would find that it would not be solvable this way.