Charlee is using her calculator to find the product of two large numbers. Her calculator shows 1.78E12 on the display. Interpret what this means. (Write like a 8th grader)

1 answer

Charlee's calculator shows 1.78E12, which is a shorthand way of writing really big numbers using scientific notation. The "E" stands for "exponent," and it means "times ten to the power of." So, 1.78E12 means 1.78 times 10 raised to the 12th power.

To break it down, here's what that looks like in regular numbers:

1.78E12 = 1.78 × 10^12 = 1.78 × 1,000,000,000,000

This means that the number Charlee found is actually 1,780,000,000,000. That's 1 trillion and 780 billion! It's a huge number, and that's why calculators use this shortcut to make it easier to read and write.