Absolute Value for 6 th Grade Learn how to solve absolute value equations

Absolute value for sixth grade. Have you ever seen number written like this before? What do you think those two lines represent? If you said absolute value, you are exactly right. Here are three things to remember about absolute value. First, every number except zero has an absolute value. Second, the absolute value of number is determined by its distance from zero on number line. Last, the placement of negative symbol inside or outside of the absolute value bars is very important. Let's try an example. If you were to figure out the absolute value of four, you would look at how far away the number four is from the number zero on number line. Like this. The absolute value of four equals four. What about the absolute value of negative number? Let's take look at what happens when the negative symbol is inside the absolute value bars. If we count the distance or units from zero again, we can see that the absolute value of -3 equals three. Because -3 is three units away from zero. So, if the negative symbol is on the inside of the absolute value bars, the value becomes positive. What do you think happens if the negative symbol is on the outside of the bars? In that case, the value is negative. Let's do an example looking at distance to help us see how absolute value works. Pretend that you are walking to your friend's house to go to birthday party and that their house is five blocks away from yours. After you have walked one block, you realize you left your friend's birthday gift at home. So, you walk back one block to your house to grab it and then walk the remaining five blocks to get to your friend's house. Even though the distance between your house and your friend's house is five blocks, you definitely walked longer distance than that to get there. So, how do you find out how far you walked? Well, first, you walked forward one block and then you walked back one block. And then you walked the five blocks to your friend's house. How many blocks is that total? To find out, let's create an equation using absolute value. Do you see how we got there? You walked one block forward, one block back, and then five more forward for total of seven blocks. Absolute value bars are grouping symbol, just like parentheses. When using the order of operations to solve an expression or equation, absolute value is determined before any other operation, which means you always do what is inside the bars first before determining the answer. So, the absolute value of -6 + 2 would be four because -6 + 2 = -4 and the absolute value of -4 is four. Here are few more examples. The absolute value of 4 + 3 equals the absolute value of seven equals seven. The absolute value of -9 + -1 equals the absolute value of -10 equals 10. The absolute value of 7 - 7 equals the absolute value of zero equals zero. Say you have an equation that looks like this. 8 minus the absolute value of 5 - 11 plus three. What do you do first? If you said figure out the absolute value of 5 - 11, you are correct. 5 - 11 = -6. And since the negative symbol is on the inside of the absolute value bars, we know that the absolute value of -6 equals six. With that information all figured out, we are ready to solve the equation. 8 - 6 plus three equals five. Nice work, everyone. Absolute value is pretty cool because you can use it to figure out useful things like distance and weather. Remember that every number besides zero has an absolute value. You determine it by measuring number's distance from zero and that the position of negative symbol is super important. Now, go have fun and create some amazing equations. Hope you had fun learning with us. Visit us at learnbright.org for thousands of free resources and turnkey solutions for teachers and homeschoolers.