JAMB 1990 · UME · Q18

Divide $x^3 - 2x^2 - 5x + 6$ by $(x - 1)$ .

Worked solution (try it first)

Use synthetic division with $x = 1$ (the root of $x - 1$ ) on the coefficients $1, -2, -5, 6$ .
Bring down 1.
Then $1 \times 1 - 2 = -1$ , and $-1 \times 1 - 5 = -6$ .
Last, $-6 \times 1 + 6 = 0$ , so the remainder is 0 and the quotient is $x^2 - x - 6$ , option A.