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Cubing a Sum and Difference

Mathematics Grade 7 Difficulty 3/5

Beginning of the lesson

Куб суммы и куб разности

Cubing a Sum and Difference

Формулы сокращённого умножения — Short Multiplication Formulas

7 класс · Алгебра

1. Введение — Introduction

You already know the формулы сокращённого умножения (short multiplication formulas) for squaring binomials:

(a + b)² = a² + 2ab + b²
(a − b)² = a² − 2ab + b²

Now we go one step further — we raise binomials to the third power (cube them):

(a + b)³ = ?     (a − b)³ = ?

These are called the куб суммы (cube of a sum) and куб разности (cube of a difference). Each formula produces four terms (not three like the square formulas).

2. Вывод формулы куба суммы — Deriving the Cube of a Sum

We start from the definition of cubing:

(a + b)³ = (a + b)² · (a + b)

Step 1: Use the square formula to expand (a + b)²:

(a + b)² = a² + 2ab + b²

Step 2: Multiply by (a + b):

(a² + 2ab + b²) · (a + b)

= a² · a + a² · b + 2ab · a + 2ab · b + b² · a + b² · b

= a³ + a²b + 2a²b + 2ab² + ab² + b³

Step 3: Combine like terms:

a³ + (1 + 2)a²b + (2 + 1)ab² + b³
(a + b)³ = a³ + 3a²b + 3ab² + b³

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