Friday, September 19, 2014

Combination Formula

Hey kids. A couple of days ago we learned how to do Combinations and I will try to repeat the lesson here as good as Mr. P teaches.
Permutations and Combinations may look similar, but have different concepts. One thing to know is that permutations is an ordered collection of elements while a combinations consists of unordered collection of elements.
Combination Notation: C(n,r) or nCr  which is also       n!
                                                                                    r! (n-r)!
Remember, we cannot use the dash method for combinations and must only select the elements (no ordering).
Here Is a simple example with the formula: 10C2
*First we write out the formula.
nCr =     n!             *then we substitute          10!
           r!(n-r)!          (n= 10, r=2)                    2!(10-2)!
*We solve the bracket in the denominator so, it equals
   10!       *Now we must cancel the 8! by listing the integers down from 10 until we reach 8
  2!8!            

=  10x9x8!    *cross out common integers             = 10x9!      
      2!8!                                                                                        2!
*now you can solve!
   10x9   =  90 which is 45. We have our answer! Yay!
      2           2

Now, let’s try it out with a word problem.
“A student has a penny, a nickel, a dime, a quarter and a half dollar and wishes to leave a tip consisting of exactly 3 coins. How many *different* tips are possible
nCr =   n!                     n= 5, r=3           *n must be total number and r must be how much is needed
          r!(n-r)!

=        5!                    =   5!
      3!(5-3)!                  3!2!

=  5x4x3  *cancel out 3        = 5x4                 = 10        And that’s basically how you use the formula!!!
      3!2!                                        2



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