The question is worded a bit strangely (in my opinion anyway), but I think your teacher wants you to describe how exponents work.
Let's say we had the expression [tex]5^3[/tex]
The base is 5 as its the bottom most value (think of something like the base of a tree or building). The exponent is 3.
The exponent of 3 tells the reader to multiply the base 5 by itself 3 times like so
[tex]5^3 = 5*5*5 = 125[/tex]
With larger exponents, it becomes more tedious to write out all the repeated multiplications, which is why many calculators have an exponent button to save time.
