FTCE General Knowledge Math Practice Test

Which of the following steps is not part of writing a number in scientific notation?

1. Move decimal to the right of the first nonzero digit

2. Indicate the power of 10

3. Write the number in standard form

4. Move left = positive power, move right = negative power

The correct answer is: Write the number in standard form

Writing a number in scientific notation involves a few key steps designed to express the number as a product of a coefficient and a power of ten. The primary steps are moving the decimal to the right of the first nonzero digit, indicating the appropriate power of ten based on the movement of the decimal point, and determining whether that power is positive or negative based on the direction the decimal was moved. The step to write the number in standard form is not part of the scientific notation process. In fact, scientific notation itself is a form of expressing numbers that emphasizes the significant digits and the scale of the number through the use of powers of ten. This means that writing the number in standard form—where it might simply be displayed in its original form without regard for the decimal placement or powers of ten—is not a relevant step for converting to scientific notation. Other steps involve the positioning of the decimal and understanding how to denote the power of ten based on whether you've moved to the left or right, which emphasizes the significance of compression of large or small numbers into a manageable format. They are crucial to correctly writing a number in scientific notation. Thus, not needing to write the number in standard form makes that particular step irrelevant to the conversion process.