We already know something about exponents and their inverses (radicals). Rational exponents are another way for use to represent radicals, which help us algebraically manipulate expressions involving exponential and radical terms.
Vocab to Understand
radicand
index
Resources
Rational Exponents (Purple Math)
PDF Simplifying Rational Exponent Expressions
Videos
Exponent Rules with Rational Exponents (AoPS)
What do Fractional Exponents Mean? (AoPS)
Radical Notation (AoPS)
Practice with Radical Notation (AoPS)
More Practice with Radical Notation (AoPS)
Evaluating Numbers Raised to Fractional Exponents (JMT)
Complex Radical Simplification
Rationalizing Denominators (AoPS)