Final answer:
To find the power of ten for 1,000,000,000, count the number of zeroes or places to move the decimal, which is nine. Therefore, the correct power of ten is 10^9.
Step-by-step explanation:
The student is asking for the correct power of ten that corresponds to the number 1,000,000,000. In order to find out the power of ten, one simple method is to count the number of zeroes following the 1, or alternatively, to count the number of places the decimal needs to be moved from the end of the number to right after the first non-zero digit to be left with a number between 1 and 10. Therefore, for the number 1,000,000,000, we count nine places from right to left, because the original decimal point is assumed to be at the end of the number (after the last zero). This makes the correct power of ten for 1,000,000,000, 109, or option 2).