Systems of equations with substitution: y=4x-17.5 & y+2x=6.5

CCSS Math: 8.EE.C.8b

Video transcript

We have this system of equations, y is equal to 4x minus 17.5, and y plus 2x is equal to 6.5. And we have to solve for x and y. So we're looking for x's and y's that satisfy both of these equations. Now, the easiest way to think about it is we've already solved for y in this top equation. Let me write it again. I'll write it in pink. We have y is equal to 4x minus 17.5. So this first equation is telling us, literally, by this constraint, y should be 4 times x minus 17.5. Now, the second equation says whatever y is, we had 2 times x, and that should be 6.5. Well, the y here also has to meet this constraint up here. It also has to meet the constraint that it has to be 4 times x minus 17.5. So what we can do is, is we can substitute this value for y into this equation. Let me be clear what I'm doing. The second equation here is y plus 2x is equal to 6.5. We know that y has to be equal to this thing right here. y has to be equal to 4x minus 17.5. So let's take 4x minus 17.5, and substitute y with that. So let's put that right there. So if we were to do that, if we were to replace this y with 4x minus 17.5, because that's what the first equation is telling us, then we get 4x minus 17.5, plus 2x is equal to 6.5. And now we have a single linear equation with one unknown. Let's solve for x. So first we have our x terms. We have a 4x, and we have a 2x. We can group them or add them together. 4x plus 2x is 6x. And then we have 6x minus 17.5 is equal to 6.5. Then we can get the 17.5 out of the way by adding it to both sides of the equation. So this is negative 17.5, so let's add positive 17.5 to both sides of this equation. And we are left with the left-hand side is just going to be 6x, because these guys cancel out. 6x is going to be equal to-- and 6.5-- see, 6 plus 17 is 23, and then 0.5 plus 0.5 is 1. So this is going to be 24. And then we can divide both sides of this equation by 6. And you are left with x is equal to 24 over 6, which is the same thing as 4. So we figured out the x value for the x and y pair that satisfy both of these equations. Now we need to figure out the y value. And we can do that by taking this x and putting it back into one of these equations. We can do it in to either one. We should get the same y value. So let's just do this top one up here. So if we assume x is equal to 4, this top equation tells us y is equal to 4 times x, which in this case is 4, minus 17.5. Well, this is equal to 16 minus 17.5, which is equal to negative 1.5. So y is equal to negative 1.5. So the solution to this system is x is equal to 4, y is equal to negative 1.5. And you can even verify that these two, they definitely work for the top one if you put 4 times 4, minus 17.5, you get negative 1.5. But they also work for the second one. And let's do that. In the second one, if you take negative 1.5, plus 2 times x-- plus 2 times 4-- what does that equal? That's negative 1.5 plus 8. Well, negative 1.5 plus 8 is 6.5. So this x and y satisfy both of these equations.