9. \( 432 \div 24 \)

Did you know that division has a long history dating back to ancient civilizations? The Egyptians and Babylonians were using division methods thousands of years ago, relying on their understanding of fractions and multiplication tables. Fast forward to today, and we have calculators to do the heavy lifting, but the original concepts still form the backbone of mathematical operations! When dividing, a common mistake is to overlook simplifying the numbers first. In this case, notice that both 432 and 24 are divisible by 12. Reducing \( 432 \div 12 \) gives 36, and \( 24 \div 12 \) gives 2, so \( 36 \div 2 = 18 \). Easy peasy! Always check if you can simplify before diving in!