Sheldon Miguel M.

Olaguer
Special products of polynomials
In the previous section we showed you how to multiply binominals. There are a couple of special
instances where there are easier ways to find the product of two binominals than multiplying each
term in the first binomial with all terms in the second binomial.

Look what happens when you square a binomial.

(x+2)2=(x+2)2=
=(x+2)(x+2)==(x+2)(x+2)=
=x2+2x+2x+4==x2+2x+2x+4=
=x2+4x+4=x2+4x+4
=x2+(2⋅2⋅x)+22=x2+(2⋅2⋅x)+22
This is a pattern that's called the square of a binomial pattern.

(x+y)2=x2+2xy+y2(x+y)2=x2+2xy+y2
(x−y)2=x2−2xy+y2(x−y)2=x2−2xy+y2
There is another pattern that is good to know. We begin by looking at an example. What happens if
we multiply two binominals where one is a sum of two terms and the other is the different between
the same two terms?

(x+5)(x−5)=x2−/5x+/5x−25=x2−25=x2−52(x+5)
(x−5)=x2−⧸5x+⧸5x−25=x2−25=x2−52
This is called the sum and difference pattern.

(x+y)(x−y)=x2−y2