Lesson 11

In earlier lessons, students extended the number line to include negative numbers. In this lesson, students extend the coordinate axes to expand the coordinate plane. In a previous unit, students worked in the coordinate plane when they examined ratio and other relationships between two quantities with positive values. They now consider an expanded coordinate plane where negative numbers appear on both the vertical and horizontal axes. The crossing axes create the four regions of the coordinate plane, called quadrants. In this first lesson on the coordinate plane, students extend their understanding of the coordinate plane to points with negative coordinates. They gain experience by choosing and plotting points in order to hit targets or to maneuver through mazes in all four quadrants of the coordinate plane.