Tianna's Comment

I agree with Alexandra about a radical being a reverse of raising a number to an exponent... This can or cannot make sense to some people... It depends on the person and their amount of skill in Math... Not saying everyone or some people are dumb.. But a lot fo the things we have learned are difficult i guess... So learning this could take a while... In the end.. im sure we will have al lthe skills we need...

Merb's Comment

Well.. yeah.. like Lanna said, this is really hard to comment on because well.. a radical's a radical and you can't really change someone's mind about what it is. Oh man.. oh yeah, and as Lanna repeated after Tianna, Chels also said that radicals could be used in science and chemistry and, well I didn't think about that until reading from your guys' posts. So thanks for the insight guys =)

Lanna

It's sort of hard to respond for this one..Ya..um..Tianna said that radicals or whatever could be used in science and stuff. I don't really see why it couldn't because they're both really confusing sometimes. :) haha...i don't really know what to say for this one..All I still really know about them is that they are hard to make sense of when you don't really understand them :).

Chels.

Radical. Hm. Oddly enough, I think of surfing when I hear that term. Strange.
So, as everybody else has discovered, a radical is a quantity, number, or amount, expressed as a root of another quantity. A radical can obviously be used in math, otherwise we wouldn't be blogging about it.. probably. It can also be used in Chemistry.
Example #1) : the squared root of 225 is 15 because 15x15=225. The radical is 15.. right?
Example #2) : the cubed root of.. 289 is 17! 17x17=289. What the heck? I said cubed root. I meant squared root. Geepers.

Blog Extension

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Just want to say this makes absolutely no sense to me. So I am just going on what I have googled. So a radical is a root sign. A radical is the reverse of raising a number to an exponent. The sign of a radical looks like a check mark thing. It is not on most keyboards. So it can not be shown here.

EXAMPLES

checkmarkX= -3

(checkmark X)2=(4)2
X=16

- A radical is a symbol placed over a number or an expression, called the radicand, to indicate the root of the radicand. When used without a sign or an index number, it designates the positive square root of the radicand i.e. 2. If both squares are meant, the radical is preceded ±. To indicate higher roots of the radicand. The radical sign is usually taken to indicate the principal root of the radicand, although any radicand with have (n) different nth roots. Radical is used to refer to the entire expression using radical signs and a radicand.

-examples: the square root of 16 is 4 because 4x4= 16
another example would be the square root of 56 is 8 or 7 because 7x8= 56

-A radical can be used in math and chemistry.

Merb.

A radical is a root symbol. Which is the root sign you could use to figure out the square, cubed etc. root of a number. And it's .. not.. on.. my keyboard! Yeah.. you need to have a number beside or in? the radical to show whatever root it is of.. I think.

So, for examples.. say the square root of 4, you would have the check mark thing and then a four, and the answer is 2.

Another example would be if you had the root check sign thing with a 3 above it or on it or something, it would be the cubed root of, say 6, and it would be 6 x 6 x 6 = 216. So the cubed root oh 216 is 6. Oh ma days.. I hate explaining things.. it works in my head, but its so hard to put into words! Oh, and I think I have to say where we use radicals? Yeah.. in math.. I have no clue where else.

Christina

The radical is the number you use to each side of an equation.
for Example: n+21=54, to find the answer to this question you must minus both sides with the radical which is 21.
n+21=54
n+21-21=54-21
n=33
from what Ive seen the older grade (9) was doing a different type of radical as Sam was saying the radical is the root of such as squared and cubed, I believe that too, but right now in grade 8 we are doing something different.

Our radical we are working on in math is main use for algebra, and answering equation.

Tyson

A radical is a symbol which is not labeled on most keyboards, So I will just tell you what it looks like. A radical is a check mark looking symbol, which is used to represent a square root of a number. A radical is mostly used in math but I guess it could be used in other things, but I can't think of anything else that it would be used for because there are easier ways to show some one a square root of a number without the wierd check mark.

EXAMPLES OF RADICALS

check mark, then a 5

3 squared, check mark, then a 7

Sam

A radical is a root sign. Radicals need a number to define what root it is. With square roots, the two is generally left off. With cube roots a 3 is written in little numbers on top of the left side of the radical. The index tells how many times the root needs to be multiplied by itself to equal the radical.

For example,

1. The square root of 9 is 3. This means that 3 x 3 = 9

2. The cube root of 64 is 4. This means that 4 x 4 x 4 = 64

Miranda

What is a radical?
A number that, when multiplied by itself an idecated number forms a product equal to a specific number. That is what i found. And like lanna, i have no idea what it means. i dont know how you use them or what they are used for. i odnt get how they are used. I would put an example on but i cant. i dont know how to do that check mark liney thing that you do. i will try to do an example.
that check marky thing then the rest is x+3=10
the second example is: the check markey thing x+2=6

Lanna

One thing I know about radical (or whatever it is) is that it DOESN'T make any sense to me. This is what an online dictionary defined it as: A number that when multiplied by itself an indicated number of times forms a product equal to a specified number. For example, a fourth root of 4 is √2. Also called nth root. Well, I guess it...umm... It still doen't make sense to me. (Is it like a root sign thing over a number will equal half or something???)I don't really know how to put it in my own words. I guess it uses algebra..that's really all I can get out of it. To me, all it can be used for right now is making me confused because it doesn't make any sense to me. I guess that once you understand it, it can be used to make equations like that less confusing (?). Maybe it's helpful in the older grades or whenever you need it. Well, I don't get how it works, but here is an example I found: The number under the root symbol is called radicand.
The expression ⁴√a (something like this) is read as “a radical n” or “the n th root of a”. An example could be √14=7 and √5-1=2
there..I hope it's good enough.

David L.

Radical means the root of a quantity as indicated by the radical sign.

Examples:
√4 = 2
⁴√x = x

You use radicals in math.

Angela J.

what is a radical?

radical, in mathematics, is a symbol placed over a number or expression.The radical sign is generally taken to indicate the principal root of the radicand.
!@#$%^&*
it is really hard to find an example!
EXAMPLE: when you do a question like n+3=5
the n is usually a radical and then they have those weird check mark looking cymbal.
here is another example of a radical: check mark z+6=12.
an bad example of a radical is when the equation is in front of the check mark thing.

Josiah - Nov. 2 week post

My group (Tyson, Sam, and I) sort of joined forces, you could say, with another pair of students (Mercedes and Chelsea) to do our scale map of Comox Valley Christian School. We sort of split up the measuring and stuff, so that each group would have equal work. Both of the groups still had to produce a separate map, but the work was completed much quicker. We at first chose to use a LONG measuring tape, but our group genius, Tyson, broke it. We then spent the next class unraveling it. Then, we tried a different approach. The pace wheel. This tool was much quicker to use, so we decided to stick with it. Our strategy's advantage was that it was sooooo fast and easy to do. A disadvantage was that only one of our joined groups could use the wheel, so one group was always waiting around, or wandering around aimlessly. I think that our strategy worked.

Topic for weeks of Dec1st - 13th

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Topic: What is a radical? What can it be used for? Give 2 examples of different radicals.