Finding the Right A-level Maths Textbook

[Trail_Builder]

right, basically, i am 16, and currently only read maths at the standard level for people my age (granted i find it easy as, and best in school and all sorta, by anyways, that enough ego boost for now hehe). and i want to start reading A-level maths (A-level is the UK maths level for 17-18 year for those who don't know the uk qualfiications). eventually ill be studying pure maths at uni probs.

I want to read some A-level stuff cause, firstly, I am interesteed in it and want to know it lol, secondly, i doing maths and further maths next year too so a head start will be uber useful specially since i doing more A-level than i should be, and thirdly, I am finding that when i am doing (well trying and reading up on) problems I havn't covered or seen the maths required :S kinda frustrating cause it means it real hard to get doing harder problems.

anyways, enough of me, I need a textbook for A-level stuff, as comprehensive as possible, and I'm asking here because I am guessing you guys will know the good from the bad lol

thnx for you help :D:D

 

[matt grime]

There is no such thing as a good A-level textbook. They're all equally crap. Instead try reading some general interest mathematics books by Simon Singh, Ian Stewart, Marcus de Sautoy. You'll get far more out of them than dull textbooks that try to teach you yet more formulae. If you really want an A-level textbook, then I suppose the red "Advanced Mathematics" book available in Waterstones et al is fine. About the only content in A-level is differentiation, and they don't do that properly (sigh) - they just teach formulae again. If you're lucky you'll get a teacher who explains what is really going on. If I were you, I'd look at the online notes from MIT's first/second year calculus classes if you want to get ahead in 'doing problems'.

 

[Trail_Builder]

do you rekon that i could handle those online classes at my current level?

baring in mind I've started to look up on problem solving without looking at A-level stuff but get confused on notation i havn't covered, and loads of other stuff.

and yeh ill be reading general interete maths on top of this :D

thnx for the advice,

 

[matt grime]

Yes, you can handle some first year courses at MIT. The US education system suffers from no streaming, and all universities, including MIT offer some surprisingly simple catch up courses. MIT have (apparently, I've never checked personally) a very laudable philosophy of making all course materials freely available.