If Carl, Steve and John have 40 sweets to share and John gets the most out of all three. What’s the smallest amount he can get?

Look, when you want to do something like put it like x^2. x2 could mean x² or x₂. so to clear confusion, know the notation. to find the product multiply the x's and you get -8x and the y's and you get 6y. since it's all being multiplied it is just -8x6y, or answer a. although the better answer is -48xy(combining -8 and 6) because you should multiply constants whenever you can.