The first step a math tutor would suggest is to understand what it means when a number has an exponent. The “power” of a number indicates how many times the base would be multiplied by itself to reach the correct value.
The second step is to write the number in the base-exponent form, and lastly calculate what the final result would be. Consider the example of 2 to the power of 4: in exponent form that would be
So re-applying these steps to our particular problem, we first convert our word problem to a base-exponent form of:
To simplify this, all that is needed is to multiply it out:
71 x 71 x 71 x 71 x ... (for a total of 85 times) = 22748860163550132835075960339738031250772809852825756855694114365588362099082031677646767634742055484421206698639260549529835430052204886065301744333645358951
Therefore, 71 to the power of 85 is 22748860163550132835075960339738031250772809852825756855694114365588362099082031677646767634742055484421206698639260549529835430052204886065301744333645358951.