The Power of 10
Exponential Notation and beyond
Have you
ever
wondered
why we got to
9 then
stopped?
Hold out your
hands, and tell me
what you see in
front of you
That’s right, 10 fingers (inc thumbs!)
Early humans counted using their fingers (some still do!!!)
Once a full set of fingers / thumbs, we got to 10
So, 10 represents a full set of units of 1
Base 10
Humanity works fundamentally in base 10 as a result – the
decimal system.
Here’s a
famous face.
How would
these people
count?
So, a race of people with 4 digits per hand
would count….in base 8!
15,16,17,20 etc
1,2,3
7,10,11
12,13,14
4,5,6
Which is why
this picture is
wrong, they
wouldn’t have
‘8’ as ‘8’ and
‘9’ as we
understand
them
Base 10 basics
thousands
hundreds
tens
units
tenths
10 to the
power of…
103
102
101
100
10-1
number
1,000
100
10
1
1/10
Exponential
notation
1 x 103
1 x 102
1 x 101
1 x 100
1 x 10 -1
Of course we can travel forever in both
directions with this table….104 to the left (ten
thousands) and next on the right would be 10 -2
hundredths etc etc
56,790,000
So, any big (or small) number can be written
as a number between 1 and 10 x 10x
The number above being 5.679 x 107
Can you see how the decimal point would ‘jump’ 7 places to the right?
0.00005679
So, any big (or small) number can be written
as a number between 1 and 10 x 10x
The number above being 5.679 x 10-5
Can you see how the decimal point would ‘jump’ 5 places to the left?
Class: enter here
Name: enter here
1. Complete the table
Number
69800000
Exponential 6.98 x 107
notation
579000000 9810000
Click here
Click here
429000
Click here
235000000
Click here
To get the ‘power’ notation, click the arrow bottom right of the font menu and select ‘superscript’
2. Complete the table
Number
0.000532
Exponential
Click here
notation
0.000000789 0.004005
Click here
Click here
0.000060011
Click here