MA, Stanford University
Teaching in the San Francisco Bay Area
Alissa is currently a teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area and Brightstorm users love her clear, concise explanations of tough concepts
Ordered pair, or coordinate points, are written as (x, y). The "x" value tells you how many units to move horizontally, or along the x-axis. The "y" value tells you how many units to move vertically, or along the y-axis. The x- and y-axis divide the coordinate plane into four quadrants. The top right quadrant is the first quadrant. Moving in a counter-clockwise direction is the second, third and fourth quadrant.
When you're working with the rectangular quadrant system which is this one, it's really important that you guys remember which one's the side to side number and which one's the up and down, same thing which one's the x number and which one's the y number.
So like here this is asking us to graph the point (3,4) and then also tell which quadrant it's in. Well it's important that you remember that the x number comes first and the y number comes second so when it says the x number is three. That means on the x axis I need to count over 3 in the positive direction; one, two, three. I also need to go four for the y that means go up four; one, two, three, four there it is. There's my point (3,4). My x number is three they y number is four and to tell us what quadrant it's in you need to remember that the quadrants are numbered like this, I, II, III, IV so this guy is in quadrant one, quadrant one.
Again use Roman numerals so you can have the proper notation and then you're all set, you got that point (3,4) on there. Just make sure you keep in mind the x is the side to side and that number comes first in the parentheses the y is the up and down.
