a thing my math teacher always taught that sticks is that the equals sign is essentially the words is the same as. Think of it this way the sentaxe would be 2x -2 is the same as 2x minus 2. we get this because initially with the parentheses we have to take the number outside which is 2 and multiply everything inside by it. 2 times x equals 2x and 2 times -1 is negative 2.
