Personalized Polynomials

I was recently collaborating with a group of NC Math 3 teachers, I truly learned a lot from them while working that project!

One thing that went across my computer screen during this collaboration project was the "Birthday Polynomial" activity. Sounds straight forward, right? Just use Desmos, right? "What could possibly go wrong", I asked myself. Well, many things went wrong.

For starters, almost all students were born in the same year and the graphs were hard for my students to manipulate. They also had an issue with all of the zeros (2003 was the popular year of birth). Needless to say, I put out many fires that day. I knew I had to revamp this activity, not ditch it, as there are a lot of great features and learning points (a little pun there).

Introducing the "Personalized Polynomial" activity. In this version, we go from a polynomial with a degree of 7 to one with a more manageable degree of 3- what we mainly use in class anyway. Students are asked to find zeros, turning points, end behavior, etc.

Give a try and have fun!

~ssb

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