To find what x is, we must rearrange the equation so that it says x=. To do this we need to get rid of the -3 on the left hand side of the equation. This can be done by adding 3 to both sides of the equation (because what you do to one side of an equation you must do to the other), which will cancel out the -3 on the left of the equation. After this step our equation now says 2x=5+3, which is the same as 2x=8. This tells us the value of 2x, but we want to know what just 1 x is, so we divide both sides of the equation by 2 which gives us x=8÷2. Then we can simply complete the division to give us x=4.