Expanding answers

[NE2000]

I heard that in Year 12 you don't need to expand answers. Eg. if you get:


Then you can just leave it like that instead of expanding it and collecting like terms etc. Is that true?

EDIT: Changed simplify --> expanding to avoid ambiguity

[dekoyl]

I was told I had to do all the simplification in GMA which cost me in the exam.

[Collin Li]

Yeah. Expanded is not necessarily better than factorised (for polynomials).

Unless the question says otherwise (i.e.: "Express your answer in the form...") then there is no need to do extra work on it.

You should simplify things like and tend towards rationalising the denominator too.

[NE2000]

Thanks, the main reason I asked was because of things like the product rule where you can get some tedious expansions to do in the end and make a mistake in the middle even if you did everything else right...

[Collin Li]

Ah... you should try to take out the common factor, and then the simplification usually becomes much easier.