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  Maths... Lesson 2: Exponents continued

I found myself in some lessons on Exponents (starting here), basically how to add, subtract, multiply and divide scientific figures, i.e. those with exponents, such as 1.323 x 24.24

What I came to appreciate, regarding my issue with the 40.3 problem, is that in the previous example, the exponents of 3 and 4 are whole numbers and dictate how much we can move a decimal point in whole "moves". A power of only .3 means that the decimal point is moving not by a whole number but instead by only a fraction. My main issue was how to do such a calculation on my Casio fx-85VH but I needed a lesson on the math first and those previous videos didn't go that far. I also wondered about "what situations might call for a decimal point moving only a fraction of a place!)

I then found myself on another video that pulled me from the comfort of 'Scientific Notation' and into 'roots'. I was shows things like square roots and cube roots (42 = 4 x 4 = 16 and 43 = 4 x 4 x 4 = 64) both of which I could do on my calculator using the square root button and shifting to the cube root button respectively. The video went into halfs and thirds, the latter being 0.3333. . ., I could use 41/3 and get 1.587 . . .  but the book has 40.3 = 1.516.

I watched this video and I still don't know how my maths book gets 1.516 from 40.3 !

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