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:
88 x 88 x 88 x 88 x ... (for a total of 86 times) = 168077587156892052580403965317318616288575035635339337282452412799903453120650466916981769235432700582348261150118509973842814108558044829561676706481907426550123331584
Therefore, 88 to the power of 86 is 168077587156892052580403965317318616288575035635339337282452412799903453120650466916981769235432700582348261150118509973842814108558044829561676706481907426550123331584.