Subject: Maths
Name: Cath
Who are you: Student

I'm feeling really stupid.
What's 3x squared??
Thank you

PS - I'm not really thick - I got 96% in the maths GCSE


Hi Cath,

Your difficulty may be that the question is not clear. Is the expression 3x2 or is it (3x)2? The latter expression can be written 3x x3x = 9x2. Thus, for example if x = 5 then

3x2 = 3 x 52 = 3 x 25 = 75, and
(3x)2 = (3 x 5)2 = 152 = 225

Penny