DELVING
deeper
Michael Weiss
Solving and Graphing
Quadratics with Symmetry
and Transformations
O
ne of the central components of high school
algebra is the study of quadratic functions
and equations. The Common Core State
Standards (CCSSI 2010) for Mathematics states that
students should learn to solve quadratic equations
through a variety of methods (CCSSM A-REI.4b)
and use the information learned from those
methods to sketch the graphs of quadratic (and
other polynomial) functions (CCSSM A-APR.3).
More specifically, students learn to graph a qua-
dratic function by doing some combination of the
following:
• Locating its zeros (x-intercepts)
• Locating its y-intercept
• Locating its vertex and axis of symmetry
• Plotting additional points, as needed
The first of these sub-skills—locating the zeros of
a quadratic function—requires that students also
learn to solve a quadratic equation by one or more
of the following techniques:
Edited by Brian Dean
Delving Deeper offers a forum for new insights into mathematics, engaging
secondary school teachers to extend their own content knowledge; it appears
in every issue of Mathematics Teacher. Manuscripts for the department should
be submitted via http://mt.mtsubmit.net. For more information on submitting
manuscripts, visit http://www.nctm.org/mtcalls.
Department editors
Brian M. Dean, bdean@pasco.k12.fl.us, District School Board of Pasco County,
Florida; Daniel Ness, nessd@stjohns.edu, St. John’s University, Jamaica, New
York; and Nick Wasserman, wasserman@tc.columbia.edu, Teachers College,
Columbia University, New York
394 MATHEMATICS TEACHER | Vol. 110, No. 5 • December 2016/January 2017
Copyright © 2016 The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Inc. www.nctm.org.
All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed electronically or in any other format without written permission from NCTM.
• Factoring and using the “zero-product
property”—
o for quadratics that can be recognized as a dif-
ference of squares
o for quadratics that can be recognized as the
square of a binomial
o for other quadratics with leading coefficient 1
o for other quadratics with leading coefficient
other than 1
• Using the quadratic formula
• Completing the square
Students also learn to determine whether a
quadratic equation has 0, 1, or 2 distinct solutions,
according to whether the discriminant is negative,
zero, or positive. Later, typically in an algebra 2
course, they will learn to find two complex solu-
tions in the case where the discriminant is negative.
They will also learn to use the technique of com-
pleting the square to rewrite a quadratic expression
in vertex form, which aids in understanding the
graph of the associated quadratic function.
These topics are, of course, interconnected in
multiple ways, and there is more than one math-
ematically logical way to sequence them together.
Unfortunately for many students, these skills are
learned largely as disconnected topics, with little
or no logical development from one to another.
For many years, reformers have called for greater
integration among the disparate topics in math-
ematics; most recently, the CCSSM joined the call
for greater coherence, arguing that for mathematics
to avoid being reduced to a collection of “discon-
nected tricks or mnemonics,” it must be taught as
“an elegant subject in which powerful knowledge
results from reasoning with a small number of
principles” (CCSSI 2012, p. 4). But whereas the
CCSSM argues that “the most important connec-
tions are . . . the links across grades,” there are also
extremely important connections that can be drawn
between and even within topics in a single grade.
In this article, I describe a collection of such link-
ages between many of the topics associated with
quadratic functions. Rather than dealing with the
properties of parabolas one at a time, this approach
weaves them together, toggling back and forth
between special and general cases to create an inte-
grated, coherent narrative about a parabola’s sym-
metry, its vertex, and its zeros.
REVISITING THE VERTEX FORMULA
In a recent article in this journal, Nebesniak and
Burgoa (2015) described a method for leading stu-
dents to a derivation of the formula for the x-coor-
dinate of the vertex of a parabola by recognizing
it as the mean of the two x-intercepts. Because the
graph of a quadratic function has reflection sym-
metry across the vertical line through its vertex,
the x-intercepts must be equally spaced on opposite
sides of that line of symmetry; so if we know the
two x-intercepts, we can locate the line of symme-
try by simply computing their average.
While the approach is a very strong one, it has
two significant limitations. For one thing, as the
authors note, it “is effective only for a quadratic
that has real roots” (Nebesniak and Burgoa 2015,
p. 430); for parabolas that do not touch the x-axis,
the method runs aground. To see the other limita-
tion, we need only consider one of the examples
in that very article. Suppose we want to locate the
vertex of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12. The method presented
in the article requires students to first find the two
solutions of 5x2 – 20x + 12 = 0, and then find the
average of those two values. The problem is that
solving that equation is hard: The quadratic does
not factor over the rational numbers, so in order
to find the x-intercepts we would have to either
complete the square or use the quadratic formula.
But the authors have already ruled out completing
the square as a method for locating the vertex, on
the grounds that “students in our entry-level course
quickly became confused as a result of the high
level of abstractness and symbolism involved”
(pp. 429–30). This leaves only the quadratic for-
mula, which is in fact the method the authors sug-
gest using (p. 432). But if the goal is to avoid having
students use the formula x = –b/2a without under-
standing its meaning, requiring them to use the
(much more complicated) quadratic formula seems
like a huge step in the wrong direction!
There is, however, an approach to the problem
that allows us to locate the vertex without first find-
ing the x-intercepts of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12. As a bonus,
Fig. 1 Shifting a parabola vertically does not change its
axis of symmetry.
this approach actually leads into an entirely differ-
ent method for solving quadratic equations, one
that requires neither the quadratic formula nor the
method of completing the square. Unlike the method
described by Nebesniak and Burgoa, this approach
works for finding the vertex of any quadratic, even
ones with no real-valued zeros, and also foreshadows
an important topic from algebra 2, namely, function
transformations. And it’s easy to use.
TRANSFORMING THE PROBLEM
We begin by reasoning as follows: We want to find
the vertex of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12. This is hard to do,
precisely because we do not know how to find the
x-intercepts of the parabola. At this point, it is help-
ful to consider one of the more well-known prob-
lem-solving heuristics in Pólya’s How to Solve It: We
ask ourselves, “Can you imagine a more accessible
related problem?” (Pólya 1973, p. xvii). One sim-
pler problem is this: Find the vertex of y = 5x2 – 20x.
(In other words, we just drop off the constant term
at the end.) We notice, before continuing, that this
parabola has exactly the same shape as the one
we are really interested in, with one exception:
It is shifted down 12 units. Here is the important
observation: Because the axis of symmetry of each
parabola is a vertical line, shifting a parabola up or
down—i.e., changing or eliminating the constant
term—does not change its axis of symmetry (see
fig. 1).
Recognizing that the axis of symmetry for any
parabola remains invariant as the parabola shifts up
or down by any amount is an example of what the
Common Core identifies as one of the Standards
for Mathematical Practice: “Look for and make use
of structure” (CCSSM SMP 7). Structure means
different things in different contexts, but here I
Vol. 110, No. 5 • December 2016/January 2017 | MATHEMATICS TEACHER 395

A SPECIAL CASE OF rise/run2
The fact that for any quadratic function y = ax2 + bx + c, the coefficient
a can be computed from a = rise/run2 (where rise and run are both
measured from the vertex) is subtle and perhaps surprising. It is not
commonly found in textbooks, despite being analogous to the well-
known fact that for a linear function y = mx + b we can compute the
coefficient of the linear term from m = rise/run. One way for students
to learn this is to have them simply choose many pairs of points on
a parabola, compute both rise and run, and verify this phenomenon
empirically. (This is, after all, how the analogous formula for the slope
of a linear function is often taught.) But why is it true?
If we label the coordinates of the vertex (h, k) and let (x, y) be
any other point on the parabola, our formula can be rewritten in the
slightly more formal way
a = (y – k)/(x – h)2,
which is easily seen to be equivalent to the usual vertex form of a
parabola, y = a(x – h)2 + k. But learning that every quadratic can be
written in vertex form is itself quite complicated for some students,
and normally rests on mastering the skill of completing the square.
Fortunately, for any particular example, the ideas in this article
provide an alternative method for rewriting a quadratic in vertex
form. For instance, working with the same example y = 5x2 – 20x + 12,
once we have used the methods described in this article to find that
the vertex is located at (2, –8), we can immediately substitute values
into the template y = a(x – h)2 + k and write down the equation y =
5(x – 2)2 – 8. Expanding the squared binomial and simplifying we find
that this does indeed exactly match our original formula.
An important detail here: One of the crucial differences between
quadratic functions and linear functions is that for lines, computing
rise/run yields the same result regardless of where on the line the
“rise” and “run” are measured; lines are homogeneous in this sense.
Parabolas are quite different: Computing rise/run2 in general produces
different results, depending on which pair of points is used. How-
ever, as long as one of the points is the vertex, the ratio rise/run2 does
always give the same result, and is equal to the leading coefficient a, as
shown above.
use the word to describe what we notice when we
see past the particulars of a problem and perceive
the generality of a situation: As we change the
constant term c, the parabola shifts upward, but
the axis of symmetry, and hence the x-coordinate
of the vertex, remains the same. So if we can find
that x-coordinate for the simpler parabola—the one
with c = 0, which passes through the origin—that
value will also be the x-coordinate of the vertex of
the parabola we are really interested in, namely,
y = 5x2 – 20x + 12.
Now to find the vertex of y = 5x2 – 20x, we will
use precisely the method suggested in Nebesniak
and Burgoa (2015): We solve the equation 5x2 –
20x = 0 and average the two solutions. Because
we have deleted the constant term, this equation
396 MATHEMATICS TEACHER | Vol. 110, No. 5 • December 2016/January 2017
is easy to solve, without any need for advanced
methods or complicated formulas; in fact, all we
need to do is factor out the common monomial
factor of 5x, getting 5x(x – 4) = 0. We find that
the x-intercepts of y = 5x2 – 20x are at
x = 0 and x = 4. We conclude that the axis of sym-
metry of both parabolas is at the mean of these
values, x = 2, as are the x-coordinates of both
parabolas’ vertices. In other words, we can trans-
form our problem into one that is much easier
to solve by recognizing our target parabola as a
transformation of another function.
Having solved the simpler associated problem,
we now return to our original problem, to locate
the vertex of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12. We have already
found that the vertex has an x-coordinate of 2.
To find the y-coordinate, we calculate 5(2)2 –
20(2) + 12 = –8, and now we know the vertex is
at (2, –8).
This method works to find the vertex of any
parabola. In general, if we want to find the vertex
of the parabola y = ax2 + bx + c, we first trans-
form the problem by dropping the constant term.
The x-intercepts of y = ax2 + bx are easy to find,
because the equation ax2 + bx = 0 factors easily
into x(ax + b) = 0, and the two solutions are then
seen to be x = 0 and x = –b/a. The axis of symmetry
(of both our transformed parabola and our original
problem) passes through the midpoint of those two
x-intercepts, at x = –b/2a. We have discovered the
vertex formula—without needing to use the qua-
dratic formula, complete the square, or do any fac-
toring beyond the most elementary type.
FROM VERTEX TO INTERCEPTS
Although we did not need to find the x-intercepts
of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12 in order to get this far, we can
now use the information we have in order to find
them. The key idea is shown in figure 2. For any
parabola y = ax2 + bx + c, the parameter a plays a
role analogous to the slope of a line: we can regard
a as a ratio of the form rise/run2, where both “rise”
and “run” are measured from the vertex (h, k) to
any other point on the curve (see sidebar, A Spe-
cial Case of rise/run2).
In our problem, we want to find the x-intercepts
of y = 5x2 – 20x + 12. We know that they are
equally distant from the axis of symmetry at x =
2. So they must be of the form 2 ± (something).
What is the “something”? It is precisely the “run”
corresponding to a “rise” of 8 needed to get from
the vertex at (2, –8) to the x-axis (see fig. 3). Since
a = 5, we need to solve the equation 5 = 8/run2,
which leads to run = 8 / 5. Depending on one’s
8 / 5.
preferences and classroom conventions, this can be
approximated as 1.265, rewritten (by rationalizing
2 1 0 / 5,
the denominator) as 2 1 0 / 5, or left as is. In any
8/5
8/5
8 / 5.
8 / 5.
 8 / 5. 2 1 0 / 5,

2 1 0 / 5, 8/5
case, we find that the solutions to y = 5x2 – 20x +
12 = 0 are 2 + 8 /85./ 5 and 2 – 8 / 5.
If we were to repeat the entire argument above
for the case of the general parabola y = ax2 + bx +
2 1 80 //5.
5, b2 − 4 ac / 2a
c, we would expect that, because the x-intercepts
are equally spaced on either side of the axis of
2
symmetry, they 5 − 4 actherefore
8 /bwould / 2a have the form
x = –b/2a ± (something). If the method above
were carried out in full, we would end up not
8 / 5.
only deriving the vertex formula but also showing
explicitly how it is linked to the quadratic formula
x = –b/2a ± b2 − 4 ac / 2a. This occurs all without
needing to master the algebraic skill of completing
the square. Fig. 2 If rise and run are measured from the vertex of the
Looking back over the methods described parabola y = ax2 + bx + c, then a = rise/run2.
above, we see that we began with a difficult-to-
solve quadratic, replaced it (through a vertical
translation) with a simpler quadratic, found the
x-intercepts of the simpler quadratic by factoring,
used those to find the axis of symmetry of both
functions, used that to find the x- and y-coordi-
nates of our original quadratic, and then finally
used those—together with the formula a =
rise/run2, itself analogous to the formula for the
slope of a linear function—to find the x-intercepts
of our original, difficult-to-solve quadratic. All of Fig. 3 Finding the x-intercepts.
the crucial graphical features of parabolas—their
zeros, their vertices, and their symmetry—are value is many other contexts, both mathematical
linked together, as we move back and forth from and otherwise.
particular examples to general principles.
REFERENCES
FROM EASY TO HARD Common Core State Standards Initiative (CCSSI).
The methods described above can be used to find 2010. Common Core State Standards for Mathe-
the vertex of any parabola, regardless of whether it matics. Washington, DC: National Governors Asso-
has 1, 2, or 0 x-intercepts, and can be used to find ciation for Best Practices and the Council of Chief
those x-intercepts (if they exist)—which means State School Officers. http://www.corestandards
it can be used to solve any quadratic equation. It .org/wp-content/uploads/Math_Standards.pdf
does not require that either the vertex formula ———. 2012. “K–8 Publishers’ Criteria for CCSS-M.”
or the quadratic formula be memorized, but does http://www.corestandards.org/assets/Math_
provide a way to derive both of them if needed. It Publishers_Criteria_K-8_Summer%202012_FINAL
provides a way to write any quadratic function in .pdf
vertex form without requiring that students first Nebesniak, Amy L., and A. Aaron Burgoa. 2015.
master the skill of completing the square. It also “Developing the Vertex Formula Meaningfully.”
establishes a connection with a topic that will be Mathematics Teacher 108 (6): 429–33.
important in subsequent courses—that adding a Pólya, G. 1973. How to Solve It: A New Aspect of Math-
constant to a function has the effect of shifting its ematical Method. 2nd ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton
graph vertically—and thereby gives students an University Press.
opportunity to engage with one of the most impor-
tant Standards for Mathematical Practice (“Look
for and make use of structure”). And as a final
Untitled-4bonus,
1 it demonstrates an important lesson in MICHAEL WEISS, mweiss@umich.edu, 9/13/16 11:38 AM
problem-solving strategies: that sometimes we can is a math teacher educator who has
gain insight into a hard problem by considering a taught at Oakland University, Michigan
9/13/16 11:38 AM
simpler, related question, and using the solution to State University, and the University of
the easier problem to gain insight into the harder Michigan. His research focuses on how authentic
one. This last lesson is perhaps the most impor- mathematical practices in the classroom can help
tant aspect of this approach to quadratics, as it has cultivate students’ mathematical sensibility.

9/13/16 11:38 AM
Vol. 110, No. 5 • December 2016/January 2017 | MATHEMATICS TEACHER 397