Question

HELP PLEASE!!!
Solve: -4(x + 1) - 3 = -3(x - 4)

-19

19

2

0

Answer 1

You need to distribute on both sides.
Are you familiar with the distributive property?

Answer 2

yeah

Answer 3

so its going to be (-4x - 4) -3=(-3x+12) ?

Answer 4

Great. You did it correctly, but after you distribute, you don't need parentheses.

-4x - 4 - 3 = -3x + 12

Answer 5

Now you have two numbers, -4 and -3, on the left side, that can be combined together, so combine them together on the left side.

Answer 6

ohh ok umm soo you do -4x-7=-3x +12?

Answer 7

Great again.
Now we want x-terms on the left side and numbers on the right side.

Let's deal with the x-terms first.
Since on the right you have -3x, you need to add 3x to the right side to get rid of -3x.
That is because -3x plus 3x = 0.
In an equation, you need to do the same thing to both sides.
Now we add 3x to both sides to get rid of -3x on the right side.

-4x - 7 = -3x + 12
+3x +3x
------------------------(add)
-x -7 = 12

Answer 8

Do you follow the step above?

Answer 9

ok so now you have to add seven to twelve?

Answer 10

Correct. Now we do the same we did to the -3x to the -7. We add 7 to get rid of the -7 from the left side, but we need to add 7 to both sides.

Answer 11

-x -7 = 12
+7 +7
--------------(add)
-x = 19

Now we only have one step left. We want x, but we have -x on the left side.
Now we need to multiply or divide -x by -1 to get x. We must do the same to the other side.

Let's divide both sides by -1:

-x/-1 = 19/-1

x = ???
(What is 19/-1 ?)

Answer 12

-19?

Answer 13

Correct.
x = -19

Now we can check to see if our solution is correct.

-4(x + 1) - 3 = -3(x - 4)

We replace x with -19, and we see if the statement is true.

-4(-19 + 1) - 3 =? -3(-19 - 4)
-4(-18) - 3 =? -3(-23)
72 - 3 =? 69
69 = 69

=? is used as a question "is it equal?"

Both sides work out to 69, so the two sides are equal,
and the solution is indeed x = -19.

Answer 14

thank you so much :)

Answer 15

you're welcome