A child walks 5m east, then 3m north, then 1m east. What is the magnitude of the child's displacement? What is the direction of the child's displacement?

You should first break up all the distances and directions into vectors and then add all horizontal vectors and verticle vectors.

He goes, 5 + 1 m east = 6m East

3 m north

displacement = root (6^2 + 3^2) = 6.708m

direction = arcTan (verticle/horizontal) = arcTan (3/6) = 26.565 degrees