Factoring INB Pages

I teach factoring a little bit differently than most people, I think.  I only teach one method and it works every time.  There's no need for boxes or fancy flow charts to tell students what to do when.  You can read my post about How I Teach Factoring.

For this unit, my interactive notebook pages are kind of bland.  However, they got the job done!

First, I taught factoring by grouping.  I listed the steps to factor by grouping, then had an example below.  Inside the hamburger book, I have lots of examples.

Next, I taught factoring trinomials.  I had the steps listed and an example below (again).  Inside the giant hamburger book there are a bunch of examples.

Lastly, I taught all those special factoring patterns...sort of.  There really isn't a need for students to know all the factoring patterns, until they notice the pattern for themselves.  They can still factor everything (that's required in my Algebra 1 standards) with the splitting the middle method I've taught them. This hamburger book lays it all out for them.

Yes, this unit had only three lessons.  Our textbook has an entire chapter for this unit!   We did a lot of practice, so we spent more than three days working on these skills, but it wasn't necessary to teach a million special cases.

I hope this helps you maybe re-think your factoring unit!

Factoring by Grouping Foldable
Factoring Trinomials Foldable
Special Factoring Patterns Foldable