2. Order of Operations and Evaluating Expressions
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Pay close attention to the order of operations.
2
According to the order of operations, expressions inside parentheses are evaluated first, while addition and subtraction are evaluated last. For the given expression, we must evaluate the exponents first, multiplications next, and finally, the difference between their results.
| Operation | Before Simplification | After Simplification |
|---|---|---|
| Calculate power | 20 - 2 * 3^2 | 20 - 2 * 9 |
| Multiply | 20 - 2 * 9 | 20 - 18 |
| Subtract term | 20 - 18 | 2 |
The expression equals 2.