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CSI: Factoring & Quadratics

Detectives,

We can literally count the seconds until the Mathemagicians deploy their world conquering
device. For their last crime spree, an associate by the name of Calcuu Paraboloid has
terrorized the United States. Based on our intel, we believe Calcuu Paraboloid is the leader of
the evil genius terrorist group. Investigators suspect that the world conquering device
intends to vaporize calculators everywhere! From Wall St. to Walmart, the world would have
to relearn how to do basic arithmetic operations. In other words, it’s the end of the world.

As the Mathemagicians have done time and time again,

they have scattered six mathematical puzzles and a
cryptic text message that must be solved. After solving
the puzzles, you can decode the message, which will lead
to Calcuu’s favorite number. So far there are six suspects
that police have questioned. It is hoped that someone with
a relatively strong number sense and geometry spatial
sense can crack some codes that have puzzled the
detectives on the case so far.

Your job is to bring Calcuu Paraboloid to justice and save the planet. You need to be prepared
to state your case and demonstrate your understanding of the following skills that Calcuu is
known to use in the notes.

- Factoring Trinomials including GCF and Distributive Property

- Quadratic Formula

- Graphing and Interpreting graphs of Quadratic Functions

In your investigation, be sure to show all of your work. We need to have clear evidence that
supports your calculations and conclusions. This is not a time to be sloppy. The slightest
miscalculation or illegible footnote could result in a not guilty verdict.

Oh, did I mention that use of a calculator might prematurely set off his world conquering
device? Good luck to you, gumshoe.

Chief Harris

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 THE SUSPECTS
Who is Calcuu Paraboloid?

NAME George NAME Martha

OCCUPATION Executive OCCUPATION Treasurer

FAVORITE FAVORITE
17,518 -9,720
NUMBER NUMBER

NAME Ben
NAME Tom

OCCUPATION Inventor
OCCUPATION Writer

FAVORITE
FAVORITE 23,402
1776 NUMBER
NUMBER

NAME Shania NAME Betsy

OCCUPATION Translator OCCUPATION Seamstress

FAVORITE FAVORITE
42,759 635
NUMBER NUMBER

! "
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Scene #1 Yellowstone National Park –- Wyoming, USA
A ranger was stunned to discover the famed petrified forest completely uprooted.
Investigators suspect Calcuu Paraboloid excavated an entire allosaurus skeleton. In the dirt,
they found this note.

Land of the free? Home of the brave? We’ll see how you hold up after we flip the switch on our
world conquering device. All electronic calculation devices will be one big cloud of poof. Go
find your abacus and pull off your socks because you don’t have a chance at solving my
puzzles.

Find the GCF of these three monomials. The coefficient of the monomial is equal to s.

792x9y13z4 1056x4yz5 220x12y6z2

s = ____
Scene #2 Silicon Valley –- California, USA
The top secret headquarters of Google was infiltrated in the afternoon by a person dressed up like
Elmo from Sesame Street. The person took sixteen prototype Google Gadgets. Based on the lost
resources, it’s quite possible Google was preparing to conquer the world on their own.

You Americans seem to spend a lot of time on your phone throwing birds at pigs. Well here you go…

Graph the path of the three projectile birds (you may need
to make tables). The birds are launched from (0,0) and the
pig sits on (4,0).

y = -2x² + 8x
y = -x² + 7x
y = 4x – x²

How many birds hit the pig?
Zero One Two Three
m=0 e=1 t=2 u = -4

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Scene #3 Hollywood Hills –- California, USA

Security officials were called to a number of celebrity homes. It seems that Calcuu Paraboloid
stole their luxury countertops. Based on the positioning of the mayonnaise jars, Paraboloid
may have also made a sandwich at each house.

Party like a rockstar! I just robbed the six most important people in America according to TMZ! I left
them each with a factoring question.

Jennifer Will Oprah

L opez S mith W infrey

15xy – 30y x2 – 8x + 7 x2 – 9x + 14

Justin Lady Chuck

B ieber G aga N orris

x2 + 11x – 26 4x2 – 25x + 6 5x2 – 6x – 8

Which four celebrities have (x – 2) as one of their factors?

Lopez, Winfrey, Bieber, Norris e = -2

Lopez, Smith, Winfrey, Bieber m = -4
Lopez, Winfrey, Bieber, Gaga s = -7
Smith, Winfrey, Bieber, Norris t=-9
Smith, Winfrey, Gaga, Norris u = -18

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Scene #4 St. Louis Arch -- Missouri, USA
Missourians were baffled when they woke up to find that their famous St. Louis arch was
stolen during the night. Witnesses saw a helicopter carrying an arch away, but assumed it
was just some other arch.

This arch will be the perfect fit for the top of
Calcuu Paraboloid -- the New Spirit of St. Louis.
our world conquering device.

The shape of the Gateway Arch in St. Louis,

Missouri resembles a parabola with the
equation h = -0.00635x2 +4.0005x – 0.07875,
where h is the height in feet and x is the
distance from one base in feet.

What is the distance from one base of the arch

to the other? This answer to the nearest foot
is equal to u.

u = ______

Scene #5 Cowboy Stadium –- Texas, USA

Calcuu Paraboloid carved a hole through the roof of the largest dome stadium in the world, the home of
the Dallas Cowboys. He escaped with their jumbotron, which happens to be the largest HD screen ever
built.

Everything is bigger in Texas. Too bad that doesn’t mean they’ll win a playoff game or beat the
Giants. After we conquer the world, we’re going to build our own football field. Help us out…

In the NFL, a football field is 200 feet longer than it is wide, and the area of the field is 57,600
ft2. What is the width of the field? W will be equal to the width.

(Before you mess this up, the field is not 100 yards long. You must include the lengths of the
endzones.) (And hey wait a second! Before you mess it up now, notice the problem is in
FEET.)

m will be equal to the

width of the field.

m = ______
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Scene #6 Kennedy Space Center –- Florida, USA
NASA was rocked when the entire facility was hit with a bioweapon. Calcuu Paraboloid used
the opportunity to steal a space shuttle. Presumably, this is the final piece of his world
conquering device. The final note was left on the stall of a NASA restroom. The final text
message followed.

Before you know it, the Mathemagicians are finally going to conquer the world! For my last puzzle, a
Mars Rover baseball toss problem!

(Vertical Motion Equations: The height H of an object t seconds after it is propelled upward with an
initial velocity v represented by H = -½ gt2 + vt + h, where g is the gravitational pull and h is the
initial height.)

Suppose a NASA rover on Mars throws a baseball upward with an initial velocity of 10 meters per
second, letting go of the ball 2 meters above the ground. Since the gravity stuff works different on
Mars, it will take longer for the ball to land. How much longer will the ball stay in the air on Mars? The
answer to this question rounded to the nearest tenth is equal to A.

Acceleration due to gravity 9.8 m/s2 3.7 m/s2

Vertical Motion Equation

When does the baseball hit

the ground?

a = ______

CRYPTIC PUZZLE SOLVER TEXT MESSAGE

Tick, tock, tick, tock.

T • E •(A • M) + (U • (S – A))
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