A short lesson on adding/subtracting like terms and factoring out a GCF.

1. Skill 21 Like Terms—Factor out the GCF page 118-120a in your
book. book.
Adding and subtracting “like terms” is not a new skill to you. Add terms with
the same variables raised to the same power by adding/subtracting their
numerical coefficients. Add terms that are just numbers together.
3x + 9x is 12 x 3x and 9x are “like terms” because they are both x to the first terms.
12a2 – 8a2 is -4a2 These are like terms because they are a squared terms.

3. Factoring out the GCF for algebraic expressions.
Factoring means that we want everything to end up as a multiplication.