Lesson Plan: Exponential Growth and Decay Mathematics • Second Year of Secondary School
This lesson plan includes the objectives, prerequisites, and exclusions of the lesson teaching students how to set up and solve exponential growth and decay equations and how to interpret their solutions.
Objectives
Students will be able to
- determine when an exponential equation represents growth or decay, namely, whether the base of the exponential function is between 0 and 1 or greater than 1,
- make deductions about growth and decay based on an equation, for example, determining growth or decay rates or initial population,
- graph exponential growth and decay problems,
- solve exponential growth and decay problems given an equation, for example, calculating a population after a given number of years/hours,
- derive the growth or decay equation from a question to find the solution to the problem,
- interpret the solutions to growth and decay problems.
Prerequisites
Students should already be familiar with
- percentage increase and decrease, including decimal multipliers,
- exponential expressions and how to simplify them,
- graphical representations of the exponential function.
Exclusions
Students will not cover
- using logarithms to solve exponential equations,
- compound interest problems.