Algebra

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Summary: Makes you a master of high school algebra and...
Review: This book inspires even those with minimal interest in mathematics. If you are passionate about math, this is a must for you. The book is simply a refresher for high school algebra. It contains numerous gems that you could hardly find in a standard algebra text. If you are a teacher, you would have learned much to improve your teaching style and knows how to make your math classes more interesting...overall, a key source to keep on your bookshelf

Rating:
Summary: Great little book
Review: This is a great book for people who are trying to learn or re-learn algebra. Explanations are very clear and there are many examples to work through.

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Summary: Splendid and illuminating algebra text.
Review: This text, which is intended to supplement a high school algebra course, is a concise and remarkably clear treatment of algebra that delves into topics not covered in the standard high school curriculum. The numerous exercises are well-chosen and often quite challenging.

The text begins with the laws of arithmetic and algebra. The authors then cover polynomials, the binomial expansion, rational expressions, arithmetic and geometric progressions, sums of terms in arithmetic and geometric progressions, polynomial equations and inequalities, roots and rational exponents, and inequalities relating the arithmetic, geometric, harmonic, and quadratic (root-mean-square) means. The book closes with an elegant proof of the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality.

Topics are chosen with higher mathematics in mind. In addition to gaining facility with algebraic manipulation, the reader will also gain insights that will help her or him in more advanced courses.

The exercises, which are numerous, often involve searching for patterns that will enable the reader to tackle the problem at hand. Many of the exercises are quite challenging because they require some ingenuity. Some of the exercises are followed by complete solutions. These are instructive to read because the authors present alternate solutions that offer additional insights into the problem.

I also highly recommend the other texts in the Gelfand School Outreach Program. They include The Method of Coordinates, Functions and Graphs, and Trigonometry. Also, to gain additional insights into the inequalities at the end of this text, the reader may wish to consult An Introduction to Inequalities by Edwin Beckenbach and Richard Bellman.