Thread: factoring 16

when factoring 16 compared to 2 thirds you divide 16 into 2x2x2x2 and then times 3
why don't 2 of the twos in the 16 cancel out like in many other cases of factorization
you are told to take only one number from each tree and in this case you take all 4?

I believe that no one can understand what you're saying?

why is it that sometimes when factoring you don't cancel out any factors when multiplying
for example 16 in the denominator
2x2x2x2 and if the other factor from a different fraction was 3 then
it would be 2x2x2x2x3 and not 2x2x3 with two of these 2 canceled?

Your question does not make much sense in either of your posts. Please provide an example (the full question/problem) and then explain with relevance to that question.
In the mean time, maybe this will help:
When factoring 2 numbers we take the highest common factor that they both share so which we can find easily by writing those numbers down as products of their primes (as you did, 2x2x2x2 or 2x2x3 etc etc). We then find the prime numbers that feature in both lists so in this example we would factor with 2x2 as 2 features twice in both lists....therefore 2x2=4 and 4 would be the highest common factor that we use.