So far I have learned an interesting topic this week that I had no experience in before, prime factors, division tables, and prime factorization. I learned that Prime factors are the factors of a number that are prime, and to find the prime factors of a number you can use a division table or a factor tree, breaking down the numbers until you get all the prime factors (ex. prime factors of 15 are 5 and 3 so the prime factorization of 15 is 3×5). I also learned this week about prime factorization and how it could be used to find the GCF (Greatest Common Factor) and LCM (Lowest Common Multiple).

In order to find the GCF I used Ms. Pahlevanlu’s method of finding the prime factors of all the numbers so for example, finding the GCF of 15 and 35 you use their prime factors 3×5 and 5×7 then you find select the numbers which have multiples in the other numbers so in this case the only option is 5 from there you decide which number has the lowest exponent. Because there is only 5 that means that 5 is the GCF for both 15 and 35. To find the LCM the steps are generally the same by finding the prime factors but instead of finding the same numbers you collect all the numbers, but if there is multiple of 1 number you need to choose the number with the highest exponent for example, 14 and 68 you would collect all their prime factors, 2 x 7 and 17 x 22 then you put it together but since there are two 2’s you choose the highest one 22 x 7 x 17 = 476.

        

This method will be very helpful in the future as a quicker way to find a GCF or LCM, but just understanding how to do this will be beneficial for school and I find much easier than other methods. I have a few challenges with this though is finding possible factors for larger numbers and trying to do the math mentally or on paper which is a little tedious here and there.