order of progression

dubdad

hi all, seeking a little advice:

i wish to return to college ater a long time out of formal education.
I was thinking of either computers , software eng. maybee, but am also interested in some of the engineering subjects such as automation and control, mechtronics etc.

I am currently trying to brush up on my maths in case i do end up on such a course (cao is gone in)

i did ordinary level maths in my leaving back in 1985:eek:

can anybody reccommend an order of learning in the diffrent maths areas.

i was thinking myself
first algebra then some trig before going on to calculus.
have read a book on algebra , thats been ok but i started straight into calculus and am struggling a little.

is linear algebra something i should only really look at if i can get to a comfortable level with all of the above first?

**Timbuk2**

I strongly recommend watching some of these free videos:
http://www.khanacademy.org/

Everything is very well explained, and there's plenty of videos to work through!
There's videos on (for example) Algebra, Precalculus, Calculus, Linear Algebra, Statistics, etc. - just keep scrolling down the page!

Depending on how much you know already - Pre-algebra, algebra, pre-calculus, calculus in that order would be very manageable!

dubdad

thanks timbuk2
all donations gratefully accepted, what i am really wondering is should i have a very good grounding in trig as well as algebra before i go on to the calculus ??

thanks in advance
btw isn't the net a great place to learn for free and at your own time.
would also reccommend : http://www.waybuilder.net/free-ed/Navigation/Level01/01_Mathematics.asp

has some very basic to (to me anyway) high level stuff, vids and some humour too if i remember correctly

**Timbuk2**

I wouldn't say you need a very good grounding in trigonometry, you'd just need to be familiar with it - just the basics of trigonometry and radians and maybe know what the graphs of cosine, sine and tan look like!

ray giraffe

"Engineering Mathematics" probably contains most of the maths you need to study: Link

If it looks a bit too condensed at the moment you could try "Foundation Mathematics" by the same author: Link. (Unfortunately the "Look Inside" is showing the wrong book.)

Also I offer maths grinds, details here.

PaulieBoy

I would do the khan academy and if you have funds then Text & Tests 4 and 5, they are standard LC pass and hons level. Any school bookshop should have them, possibly secondhand. I would forget the Engineering Maths books till you have fully covered T&T or equivalent. Text & Tests can be read at home it's fairly self contained. Hundreds of questions all with answers ensures you know the topic when done.

Best of luck with the whole back to college thing. I did it and loved it :-)

KeithTS

Hi,

I was in the same boat as you a couple of years ago.
I had no leaving cert and was looking to get into Engineering.

What I did was get the junior cert books and worked through them just so I knoew all the basics properly, you should find it handy enough and get through them in no time, I just went through the books chapter by chapter then did the same with the LC books.

They are laid out in a such a way that if you work through them on your own you should cover the appropriate material as you need to.

I also found "Basic Engineering Mathematics" by J.O Bird a great help too, definitely worth a look.

By covering the leaving cert material you'll have the same maths as everybody else in your course so you should have everything you need there.

dubdad

thank all for your advice.
some glreat stuff there in the khan academy all right. I think I will also go with some of the school text books, so its back to the grindstone for me.
have to say i'm actually enjoying this. There have been a few 'lightbulb' moments thus far but understanding the fundementals rather than just learning something off is the only way to go; then i find that working through problems and being able to solve them and then check them with another method is very rewarding.

humbert

Another plus one for the Kahn Academy. It's a truly fantastic resource

eire-kp

I got recommended this online book on another thread.
http://www.uea.ac.uk/jtm/contents.htm

It contains no calculus though..is this covered in text and tests 4 and 5?