Multiplying Powers of Ten

This Instructional Activity is a part of the Lesson 2, Unit 7, Grade 8. The goal of this activity is to help students flexibly transition between different notations for powers of 10 and introduce the property of multiplication of values with the same base. Students observe that 10^n × 10^m = 10^{n+m} for values of n and m that are positive integers. The second question hints at the reasoning that will extend exponent rules to include zero exponents, but students will investigate that more deeply in a later lesson.