Question

Can someone please help me with the question: What are the differences in factoring a 2-, 3- and 4-term polynomial?

Answer 1

You might want to try actually factoring one example each of 2-, 3- and 4-term polynomials as preparation for answering this question.

First case: 2-term polynomial (which is called a "binomial"):
2x+4
Can this be factored? If so, factor it, please.

Next, 3x+4
Can this be factored? If so, factor it.

Now try factoring a trinomial (3-term poly): x^2 - 2x - 3. How is the process of factoring different from before?

Answer 2

Thank you! @mathmale

Answer 3

My pleasure! You might want to think about how you might approach factoring a 4th-degree polynomial. What methods come to mind? sometimes that's easy; sometimes you'd want to pull your hair out! :)