Mathematical English

Topic outline

• Goal and Objectives of Course

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  GOAL: The goal of this course is to teach students the basics of university-level mathematical English.

  OBJECTIVES: At the end of this course students will be able to understand, read, and write at least basic mathematical English.  Students will also learn how to read mathematical equations such as 

   $f(x)= \lambda \dfrac{a \sin(2x)}{\int_{s=r}^{s=t} \exp(3.9 \times 10^{-4} sx)ds}$  .

  
  

  This particular skill is vital when you converse with fellow mathematicians or engineers in other countries - and also when you make oral presentations at international conferences: English has become the international language of mathematics. 

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• Numbers: how to read and write them

  Learn to read and write numbers - with Youtube videos.

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    Very important:  When writing numbers in English, commas (,) are used to define thousands (1,200)  and periods (.)  are used for decimals (0.35).  This reverses the roles of the period and comma  in Latin countries.   (You must be familiar with this if you do any programming). For example 3.500,67 in French  is written 3,500.67 in the Anglo-Saxon world. 

    You will find below two similar YouTube videos which explain how to read numbers - but only positive natural numbers: 1, 2, .... etc.  Later in the course you will learn how to read -1.78, 8.0098, 4.5E(-62), etc.

     The first video comes from America and the second from Australia.  There are differences between American-English and British-English.  For example the former will say "one hundred" - the latter "a hundred".   But these differences are small - the general recommendation is to be consistent when writing: American or British English - never a mixture.   This applies to ordinary, everyday words, such as "color" in American English and "colour" in British English.

    How to read numbers: the American way.

    
    

    How to read numbers: the British (or Australian) way.

• Univariate Calculus

  basic single variable stuff

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    Newton, Leibniz and Usain Bolf

    
    

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    A pretty young lady explains the basics of integration   

    
    

• Multivariable Calculus

  Calculus of several variables

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    Introduction to vector fields ("champs de vecteur") 
    

    
    

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    Two great videos explaining Green's Theorem 
    

    
    

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    Intro to line integrals ("intégrales curvilignes")

    
    

• marc topic 2

  summary topic 2 

• Topic 5

• Topic 6

• Topic 7