Page 8 - My FlipBook

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Using Negatives People who

NEGATIVE NUMBERS Today, negative numbers are used have a bank account 100ºC
for everyday activities, such as in
with a negative
banking. Most countries measure value are said to be
temperatures in Celsius as the freezing overdrawn.
Any number above zero is a positive point of water is 0 degrees Celsius. 50ºC

number, but any number below zero
is a negative. Negative numbers have

been around for a long time. Zero degrees Celsius is the temperature
0 C at which water freezes. Temperatures 0ºC
o

Negative History (32ºF) below this (in Celsius) have a negative value.

The Chinese were using negative The average -50ºC
o
numbers in their mathematics as -55 C temperature on Mars.
long ago as 200 bce. Eight hundred (-67ºF)

years later, the Indian mathematician -100ºC
Brahmagupta created mathematical o The lowest recorded temperature

rules for using negative numbers. -89.2 C on Earth, Vostok Station, Antarctica.
The Arab world continued to develop (-128.6ºF) -150ºC

the idea of negative numbers, but the In the 1600s, the English
concept did not reach Europe until mathematician John Wallis

o
the 1400s. created a number line that -273 C The lowest possible temperature,
included negative numbers. -200ºC
(-459.7ºF) known as absolute zero.

-250ºC
Thinking in Lines

-5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 Any number above zero is a positive number. On the
number line, they are counted up from left to right

NEGATIVE POSITIVE from zero. Negative numbers have a “-” in front of
NUMBERS NUMBERS them and they are counted to the left from zero.

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