WhatI learned from a great math teacher today: mathematics in life (and in college) is not about discreet one-operation problems but about the big messy problems that look vague on paper, that require breaking down into many parts you have to figure out through different operations, that have a context of something you can, at least, imagine.
For your answer, you bring all the parts together. That would be synthesizing.
In real math as in real reading and writing, synthesis is necessary to find the meaning (aka: the answer).
Thank you, Julie Stremel, at Denver Center for International Studies @ Montbello.