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subtraction is used to find the
difference between two numbers you can
also think of it as the opposite of
addition instead of putting two or more
numbers together like you do when you
add when you subtract you're taking a
number apart
suppose you have five apples and you use
three of them to make a pie that means
you have two apples left you can write
this as 5 minus 3 equals 2 the minus
sign is used when you subtract an easy
way to subtract numbers is to stack them
if you want to subtract 6 from 18 first
stack 18 the larger of the two numbers
on top of 6 notice that the ones
positions for each of the two numbers
are lined up vertically put a minus sign
on the left of the stack and draw a line
at the bottom now you're ready to
subtract first subtract 6 from 8 in the
ones place 8 minus 6 is 2 so put a 2
below the line there's nothing below the
one in the tens place to take away so
bring the one down below the line the
answer or difference is 12
let's try another problem 24 minus 5
since 4 is smaller than 5 you're going
to have to borrow from the number to its
left 2 2 is in the tens place which
means that we have two tens borrow one
of them and add it to the four in the
ones place to get 14 cross out the two
and replace it with a 1 since we only
have one 10 left after borrowing 14
minus 5 equals 9 so put a 9 below the
line since there's nothing to subtract
from the one Romania in the tens place
bring the one down below the line the
answer or difference is 19 now you know
the basics of subtraction
you