To determine how far the soccer ball has traveled when it hits the ground, Leon can use the Zero Product Property. This property states that if the product of two factors equals zero, then at least one of the factors must be zero.
Given the equation:
\[ 0 = -12x(x - 20) \]
Leon can set each factor equal to zero:
- \( -12x = 0 \)
- \( x - 20 = 0 \)
Now he can solve these equations:
- From \( -12x = 0 \), dividing both sides by -12 gives \( x = 0 \).
- From \( x - 20 = 0 \), adding 20 to both sides gives \( x = 20 \).
Thus, the two solutions to the equation are \( x = 0 \) and \( x = 20 \).
To summarize, Leon can use the Zero Product Property to find the horizontal distance the ball has traveled when it hits the ground by solving the two equations: \( -12x = 0 \) and \( x - 20 = 0 \).
So the correct choice is:
Solve the two equations: −12x=0 and x−20=0.