ShmoopTube
Where Monty Python meets your 10th grade teacher.
Search Thousands of Shmoop Videos
Algebraic Expressions Videos 17 videos
Number Sense: Drill Set 4, Problem 3. Simplify the expression.
Rigging your friend's scale so it looks like she's shedding the pounds: being a good friend, or being a total creeper? Translate a word problem int...
What do poetry and basic operations have in common? Watch this video to find out.
CAHSEE Math 4.1 Number Sense 218 Views
Share It!
Description:
Number Sense: Drill Set 4, Problem 1. Simplify the expression.
Transcript
- 00:03
And here's your shmoop du jour...
- 00:05
Simplify the expression (8) to the -3 times (16) squared.
- 00:11
And here are the potential answers...
- 00:18
How in the world do we take a negative exponent?
- 00:21
The process isn't really that intuitive.
Full Transcript
- 00:23
It's like GIVING someone a bunch of taxes. Just doesn't make natural sense.
- 00:28
Let's start with the second part of this,
- 00:30
...square 16... so 16 times 16 which is 256. Done.
- 00:35
Now we have to figure out how we can negatively cube 8.
- 00:39
One thing that'll help is to realize that anything to a negative exponent can be rewritten
- 00:43
as 1 OVER that number...
- 00:45
...that is, 8 to the negative 3rd power is the same as 1 over just a normal positive 8... cubed.
- 00:52
So the first part is just 1 over 512.
- 00:58
Now we have 1 over 512 times 256... which is 256 over 512... or 1 over 2 or just one half.
- 01:09
And our answer is B.
Related Videos
CAHSEE Math: Algebra and Functions Drill 5, Problem 3. Solve the equation.
ACT Math: Pre-Algebra Drill 2, Problem 3. Which of the following numbers is smallest?
ACT Math: Pre-Algebra Drill 2, Problem 4. Which of the following numbers is largest?
SAT Math: Algebra and Functions Drill 1, Problem 2. Based on the data in the table, what is the maximum heart rate for the average 22-year-old?
We don't like knocking people down to size, but we do like simplifying radicals. Join us?