Hello, The Casio FX-300ES does not handle symbolic algebra. So it cannot factor a general polynomial expression. The methods can be found in any book on Algebra. However if you are interested in approximate factorization of quadratic and cubic polynomials, you can use the calculator to do that. It can solve aX^3 +bX^2+cX+d =0 and the quadratic equations. If you want to factor a cubic polynomial P3(X) = aX^3+bX^2+cX+d , you write the corresponding cubic equation as aX^3+bX^2+cX=d =0 , then you divide all terms of the equation by a to obtain X^3+(b/a)X^2+(c/a)X+(d/a)=0. You use the calculator to solve (approximately) this equation. Suppose you find the 3 roots X1,X2,and X3. Then the polynomial X^3+(b/a)X^2+(c/a)X+(d/a) can be cast in the factored form (X-X1)(X-X2)(X-X3) and the original polynomial P3(X) can be written as P3(X) = a*(X-X1)(X-X2)(X-X3) You can handle the quadratic polynomial the same way. P2(X) =a*(X-X1)(X-X2) where X1, X2 are the two real roots Hope it helps.
