Expert: Lynn Houston - 8/28/2008

Question
She has a problem where
x=7 and y= -2
x=2 and y=3
x=3 and y=2
x=4 and y=1
How to figure AND explain......not just the answer

Answer
Ok, the only thing I can think of is that your daughter is doing graphing and these are points on a graph.  If you have graph paper, that would be easiest, you can print some (just google "graph paper") or just take a piece of paper and draw a horizontal line and through that a vertical line.  The horizontal line is the x axis and the vertical line is the y axis.  Starting where the lines cross, going right, draw equal tick marks (you need to go to at least 7) and number them one thru seven.  From the center going left, draw the tick marks again the same distance apart as you just marked and label them -1, -2, -3 (-1 closest to the center).  Do the same for the y axis.  Positive numbers going up and negative (-) numbers going down.  Now, when x=7 and y = -2, you go to 7 on the x axis and then from there, 2 down and put a dot.  That is (7,-2).  Do the same for the rest of the x and y values.  You can label each dot with the coordinates (x=2 and y = 3 would be (2,3)).

If you're not doing graphing, then I need some more info to answer your question.

Let me know if you don't understand something.