Question

Consider firing a pumpkin from a canon at a target that is 17 meters away. The pumpkin follows a quadratic path as displayed to the right. Will the pumpkin hit the target? 1a. Use the graphing calculator to make a table of the given ordered pairs. Include (0,0) in your table. b. Find the equation for the parabola. Round all co-efficients to the nearest tenth. (2 points) c. Find the roots of the equation from part b. (2 points) d. Will the pumpkin hit the target? (1 point)

Answer 1

A ) This is a quadratic function:
y = a x² + b x + c
If the starting point is ( 0, 0 ) then c = 0
b ) The function is:  y = - 0.2 x² + 3.6 x
( with coefficients to the nearest tenth )
The graph is in the attachment.
c ) The roots:
x 1 = 0,
0.2 x = 3.6
x = 3.6 : 0.2 
x 2 = 18
d ) This is near the target  ( 17 m ) . So the pumpkin will hit near the target.

Download docx