Dividing Polynomials

A polynomial looks like this:

example of a polynomial
this one has 3 terms

Dividing

Sometimes it is easy to didvide a polynomial by splitting it at the "+" and "-" signs, like this:

When I split the polynomail into two parts, I still had to keep the "/3" under each one.

Then the highlighted parts were "reduced" (⁶/₃ = 2 and ³/₃ = 1) to leave the answer of 2x-1

Here is another, slightly more complicated, example:

What happened? We couldn't simplify "¹/_3x" any further. So it has to stay like that. But the answer is still "simpler"

Now, sometimes it helps to rearrange the top polynomial before dividing, as in this example:

If those methods don't work, you may need to use Polynomial Long Division