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Exercises Graphs and straight lines

Example 11.30 from Prealgebra, 11.4 Understand Slope of a Line

Understand Slope of a Line: example 11.30

What is the slope of the line on the geoboard shown?

The figure shows a grid of evenly spaced dots. There are 5 rows and 5 columns. There is a rubber band style loop connecting the point in column 1 row 5 and the point in column 5 row 2.

Work it out on paper first. Then open the solution one step at a time, and stop as soon as you can finish on your own.

Solution
Use the definition of slope.

$m = \frac{rise}{run}$

Start at the left peg and make a right triangle by stretching the rubber band up and to the right to reach the second peg.

Count the rise and the run as shown.

$\begin{matrix} The rise is 3 units . & m = \frac{3}{run} \\ The run is 4 units . & m = \frac{3}{4} \\ The slope is \frac{3}{4} . \end{matrix}$

Your turn

The book's Try It right after this example: same idea, new numbers. Only the answer is given.

What is the slope of the line on the geoboard shown?

The figure shows a grid of evenly spaced dots. There are 5 rows and 5 columns. There is a rubber band style loop connecting the point in column 1 row 5 and the point in column 4 row 1.

How did it go?

PreviousGraphing with Intercepts: example 11.29 Next Understand Slope of a Line: example 11.32

From Prealgebra (1st edition) by OpenStax (Rice University), section 11.4, licensed under CC BY 4.0. Original at openstax.org. We split the solution into steps; the words, numbers and figures are the book's. OpenStax doesn't endorse this site.