QUICK!!!! TEST SOON AND PANICKING!!!!! NEED EXPERT HELP IMMEDIATELY!!!

Question

During the graphing of slope intercept form, if you have a negative numerator and a positive denominator, does that make the whole slope fraction negative? Or do you still go down the graph 3 (negative) and to the right two (positive)?

Answer 1

If the slope is negative you will only move in the negative direction with one of the numbers.

Example: slope -3/5 means down 3 and right 5

If it is a whole number negative, you imagine it as a fraction and follow the same steps:

Example: slope = -3 means the slope is -3/1 so you will go down 3 and right 1

Hope this helps!

Answer 2

Hi Arabella,

A negative numerator and a positive denominator give you a negative quotient. That's just the way arithmetic works! And it doesn't matter whether you assign that "-" sign in the numerator or in the denominator -- either way, you plot the same slope (try it both ways and see).

-- Cheers, - Mr. d.