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1 comments about Advanced algebra and calculus (Made simple self-teaching encyclopedia).

1. When Stephen Hawking was planning his book, `A Brief History of Time', his publishers warned him that he would lose half his readers (and hence, half his purchase-royalties) for each equation he included in the text. Despite this admonition, he did include one (Einstein's E=mc).
   
   Alas, for a calculus book, even one with the title of `Advanced Algebra and Calculus Made Simple', has no choice but break the rule on equations, and hence is not likely to be purchased widely.
   
   The `Made Simple' series includes much more than simply Calculus. In the 1970s as a young teenager I collected many of these books (which, as I am someone who never throws a book out, all still sit on my shelves). These include the following titles:
   
   Biology, Botany, Zoology, Chemistry, Physics, Electronics, German, Latin, Everyday Law, Religions of the World, and Philosophy -- all made simple, or made easy (the titles shifted at some point).
   
   Additionally, there as a Mathematics Encyclopedia put out by the same firm, and a preparatory volume, `Intermediate Algebra and Analytic Geometry Made Simple' as precursor volume to this title at issue here. They also put out another volume I have, the greatly mis-titled `Statistics Made Simple'. But that's another story.
   
   Can calculus be made easy? I think so, but I'm not sure if this volume follows through on its pledge in the title. Rather like the slim volume I have from the 1930s, part of a series entitled `Mathematics for Self-Study', four volumes concluding with `Calculus for the Practical Man' (of course, women didn't study calculus in the 1930s, we all know!) -- there is probably not a less practical volume of calculus in existence than this, and the made simple volume likewise is not made all that easy.
   
   Most of the `Made Simple' volumes in other areas are fairly accessible to readers. Partly this is done be focussing upon broad issues and topics and not dipping into too much detail. However, this approach fails in topics like algebra, chemistry, languages and calculus where the knowledge is in the details. The layout is reasonable -- I've studied calculus in three different texts (John Olmsted's volume, Howard Anton's volume, and Angus Taylor's volume, each of which bears the basic title `Calculus with Analytic Geometry'), and found that the approach in `Advanced Algebra and Calculus Made Simple' is certainly no more difficult than in these other volumes.
   
   It covers in its chapters all of the basic beginning issues of calculus: rates and limits, derivatives, differentiation, integration -- but it doesn't get too far into any of these. One must wonder, for example, why Anton or Taylor would devote entire chapters or sections of chapters to a topic (say, for instance, logarithmic and exponential functions) where the 'made easy' volume seems to cover these in but two or three pages! Hmmm, perhaps something is missing here...
   
   I must confess that my mathematics skills are not up to snuff as they once were (I started university in the accelerated, honours mathematics programme, but have gone in another direction) -- math is one of those skills that if you don't use it, you lose it, and while I am still generally far above my other religious-studies oriented fellow students in mathematical abilities, and am rare among seminarians in that I have 50 or so math texts on my shelf, spanning from basic algebra to non-euclidean topology and advanced differential equations, I still have to open the book and explore to remember the most basic of calculus or trigonometric functions. In this task, the `Made Simple' series serves me admirably, because it does condense topics into just a few pages, and those few are generally sufficient to remind me of what I've momentarily forgotten.
   
   Given that these volumes are generally inexpensive compared to other texts of the same topics (which is undoubtedly why, as a young teenager I acquired so many), they are useful references, and `Advanced Algebra and Calculus Made Simple' is no exception in that regard.
   
   So, have fun -- see for yourself if, for you, it can be that calculus can be easy.
   
   There may be a quiz!

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5 comments about Spanish (Made simple self-teaching encyclopedia).

1. Having myself first learned Spanish with the original Spanish made Simple, I was eager to use this book as a teaching tool for an adult class. The most current edition is very close to the original , the revision being in monetary values and dates. There could have been some other revisions giving a more current touch to the story. Also, there are printing mistakes in the pronunciation keys that are very disconcerting to the beginner.
   Having said that, it's still a much better book for beginners than the Spanish for Gringos, and a good book to brush up on what you may have forgotten !
   I would recommend this to anyone wanting to learn sentence structure, not just the
   one liners in the Gringo books.



2. I bought this book to go along with a course I was taking. Though the teacher did not do a very good job, having the book made understanding the language much easier.



3. This is generally a good book for teaching beginning Spanish. However, it has a couple of glaring deficiencies: 1) There is NO INDEX in the back of the book, so looking up a specific topic is time consuming. 2)Also, although it has a small bi-lingual dictionary section in the back and exercise answers in the back, there are NO APPENDICES. Thus, no section for verbs or special grammar problems.
   In addition, the delay of introducing anything but the present tense makes the students impatient to learn more quickly.



4. My son and I have found this book very useful. He was lost in 7th grade Spanish, and this book has clarified the points that he was struggling with. He discovered that Spanish could be simple if explained logically with good examples. The only lack is audio back up.



5. I've used this book as part of a one-on-one class and the feedback from students and instructors were high. It would be best if purchased with cd. Easy to ready and a variety of examples which makes learning easier!

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