This course was a fun and exciting experience...The way everything was carefully explained and all of the assignments were really helpful. This course made me love mathematics even more! Thanks a lot!
My love for Mathematics in the past few years is like the electrocardiogram (Điện tâm đồ) of a near-death patient, which is peaceful as the surface of a calm lake. This does not annoy me at all, despite for the fact that I used to be called the smartest one in class, in this specific topic particularly. Then, how did I end up like this? Fortunately, Professor Keith Devlin points out that this is not exceptional. It is not true that people are born to be good or bad at math by default, and keep up the trend till they die. In fact, there is always a transformation in mathematical thinking from high school to university level, that almost no one was told when they were students. Moving from being taught a fixed set of techniques to solve a problem, now you are asked to be able to abstract things and reason about it, which naturally confuse learners. To prepare for such transformation, this is the exact course you need. My personal opinion: I wish that I have taken this course 5 years ago, so I can learn a bit more about Algebra. First year undergraduate students, mark my words: take it!. Course review: In the first half of the course, Professor teaches the importance of understanding the primitive mathematical notations, how careful you should be when formulate a problem, and do not rush when attack it. The quizzes successfully demonstrate the second and third points. In the second half, it's amazing to see how one can derive mathematical reasoning solely from the truth tables, and apply it to produce appropriate techniques to solve problems. Only now that I know it's not black magic when somebody choose an arbitrary value that I have no idea where it comes from in a proof. In the last 2 weeks, he gives us a few touch on set theory and real analysis, the two subjects that I suddenly feel attracted to, not to mention his sense of humour when introducing them ;) Notably, throughout the whole course, Professor shows us how to evaluate a proof, and I do learn a thing or two about it. As he always says, the point of a proof is 1) establising the truth and 2) explaining it for the readers, math will be interesting once you learn its way of thinking. I now feel more ready than ever to read a mathematical problem; specifically, where to look for in the beginning of a proof, and the abstract idea of how the authors come up with their chain of deduction. Thank you so much Professor.