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What's the Point? Collinear v. Coplanar

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I could not recall a time where I learned about collinear or coplanar points and what they represent. I wasn't familiar with this concept, so I knew I would have to do a little more research to learn more about it. I found a really great video that broke down collinear and coplanar points down for me.  What are Collinear and Coplanar Points? . I like that this video provided me with lots of examples of both collinear points and coplanar points. Here are basic definitions of collinear and coplanar points: Collinear Points:  When three or more points lie on the same line .  Coplanar Points:  When three or more points lie in the same plane . If you look at this figure above we can name a few points that are collinear and that are also coplanar.  Collinear Points: A, P, C are collinear points because they all fall on the same line.  D, P, B are also collinear.  Coplanar Points:  B, C, A, D are coplanar points because they all fall under the same plane. 
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Time to Take on Triangles!

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Wouldn't it be nice if we could go back to our Kindergarten days where identifying a triangle meant that the shape had three sides and three points? I miss that... Now we know there are many different types of triangles! They each are identified differently and have certain characteristics that classify them as a certain type of triangle. When we started this Geometry unit I could only remember four types of triangles: Right, Isosceles, Acute, and Obtuse. However, I couldn't remember how to identify these triangles either. Upon further research I discovered that there are two other triangles: Equilateral and Scalene. I found a great video from Khan Academy that gave me lot of good information on these triangles.  I didn't realize before that Scalene, Equilateral, and Isosceles triangles are triangles that are triangles that have equal sides or at least two sides that are equal. Acute, Right, and Obtuse triangles are triangles that are classified by their angles. T
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Getting a Grasp on Graphs

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There are so many different graphs! I forgot just how many there were. I would consider myself pretty good at assembling graphs, but something I learned from this class was when to use a certain graph over the other. I'm going to talk about just four graphs that I struggled with when we first started working with graphs. I hope that this information could then help someone else who may have been struggling with these types of graphs as well. -Pictograph: I know what you're thinking. Aren't Pictographs just graphs represented with pictures? Well, I knew this, but what puzzled me was why and when anyone would ever use this type of graph. It seems to be the least accurate. I learned that Pictographs are pictorial graphs that display data. Pictographs are better used when the images are displaying whole or half number amounts. It can be hard to display super accurate information in a pictograph, but they can still be effective. Example: How many hats were sold in separa
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Mean, Median, and Mode....OH MY!

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Mean, Median, and Mode. I do remember learning about this in Elementary School. I also remember that I didn't find it too challenging. However, I don't think I really ever fully understood the importance of finding the Mean, Median, and Mode of data sets. Actually, maybe I knew the importance of Mean and Mode, but I never really understood what was so important about the Median? I remembered how to calculate the Mean, Median, and Mode of data sets, but I couldn't remember each of their definitions. I really enjoyed the video I placed down below. When I was in Elementary School I definitely did not know I was dealing with Statistics when finding the Mean, Median, and Mode of data sets. Through more research I finally found out the real importance of finding the Median of data sets. The way I now understand it is that the Median is the middle of your data set, so it is the middle of your distribution. When you're looking at the distribution of your set you would the
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What are the Odds?

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Odds in favor and odds against. I really had not put much mathematical thought into the simple question, "what are the odds?" It surprised me when I encountered some of these math problems in our probability homework/unit. First, I really had no idea how to calculate these problems. Second, I really hadn't thought about the fact that you could calculate the odds of something occurring. I feel as though I knew this was possible, but hadn't given it much thought. I was excited to learn how to work out these problems and how I could find the odds in favor of an event happening or the odds against that event occurring. I could not remember a time where I calculated the odds of an event. I really enjoyed the definitions and examples that this website provided for odds in favor and odds against,  Mathplanet . This gave me an idea of what these questions were actually asking of me. I found the formulas of odds in favor and odds against from our Textbook to be extremely hel
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The Possible and Impossible...

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We kicked off MAT 257 with Probability! I remember in Elementary School I really enjoyed probability. I was a little nervous to start probability in this class because I wasn't sure if I would remember everything or not. I was also worried that many things may have changed with the new Common Core standards.The first thing I thought of when thinking about probability were Tree Diagrams. I remember I had a really hard time with these when I was in school and it took me a long time to understand how they worked. I found this website, MathIsFun , to be extremely helpful at explaining what a Tree Diagram looks like and how they are used when dealing with probability problems. Going through my activities and homework helped remind me of the many methods to use when dealing with probability problems. I personally find it very helpful to draw pictures for many of these problems. A visual representation of events makes it a lot easier to see what is happening and understand what will hap
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