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Section 1.3 Skills: New Functions from Old Functions

Section 1.3: New Functions from Old Functions

This section covers how to build new functions from existing ones through transformations, combinations, and compositions.


Skills in This Section

Skill Description Difficulty
Function Transformations Overview of graph transformations Beginner
Vertical and Horizontal Shifts Translating graphs Beginner
Reflections and Stretches Flipping and scaling graphs Intermediate
Combining Transformations Multiple transformations in sequence Intermediate
Function Arithmetic Sum, difference, product, quotient Intermediate
Function Composition $(f \circ g)(x) = f(g(x))$ Intermediate

Learning Path

graph TD
    A["Function Transformations"] --> B["Vertical/Horizontal Shifts"]
    A --> C["Reflections & Stretches"]
    B --> D["Combining Transformations"]
    C --> D
    E["Function Arithmetic"] --> F["Function Composition"]
    D --> F

    click A "function-transformations.html"
    click B "vertical-horizontal-shifts.html"
    click C "reflections-stretches.html"

    click D "combining-transformations.html"
    click E "function-arithmetic.html"
    click F "function-composition.html"

Key Transformation Rules

Transformation Formula Effect on Graph
Vertical shift up $c$ $f(x) + c$ Graph moves up
Vertical shift down $c$ $f(x) - c$ Graph moves down
Horizontal shift right $c$ $f(x - c)$ Graph moves right
Horizontal shift left $c$ $f(x + c)$ Graph moves left
Vertical stretch by $c$ $c \cdot f(x)$ Graph stretches vertically
Horizontal stretch by $c$ $f(x/c)$ Graph stretches horizontally
Reflection over $x$-axis $-f(x)$ Graph flips vertically
Reflection over $y$-axis $f(-x)$ Graph flips horizontally

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