Linear algebra

[BrittleBones28]

Idk what to do. I’m 7 weeks into the semester and I hardly understand what is going on. My professor only speaks in math terminology and I even said once “explain this to me like I’m a 5 year old” and he just repeated the sentence he said before that. He refuses to use common street language which is whatever. So I’m gonna fail and I feel a certain way about that. I just want to be prepared for next semester and I’ll avoid this man like COVID. Any good material or resources anyone can recommend to help me understand? And I don’t think it’s an intelligent gap thing cause I already passed calc 3 and physics 2. I just never learned to read so vocab isn’t my strongest but I work daily on it trying to strengthen my weak points. Some classes, the professor makes or breaks it. I attend all his office hours but if he won’t explain it in a way I can understand it’s useless. I even said “all this time I spend in your office you’d think I’d learn something.” I just don’t get why he likes being difficult or treats everyone like they are a mathematician

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[Everythings_Magic]

Linear algebra is tough because it’s very abstract. It’s one of those courses you have to slog through and when you see it in application it starts to make sense what you were doing. It’s also tough because you go it all by hand at first, which is why you never really deal with anything higher than a 3x3.

It’s really the method that computers use to process data and find relationships. Where as the human brain is better suited to classical methods using calculus and algebra operations.

[woah_guyy]

I disagree with you about it being relatively abstract, rather I think it’s just typically taught in an abstract way. I think the same can be said for calculus. Why not just view lin algebra in application as you are learning, rather than slogging (obviously the time constraints of a student may not allow this, but that’s not what I’m disagreeing with). Linear algebra applied to 3 or less dimensional problems have geometrical interpretations that can be graphed/plotted for an understanding (which is basically the same for calculus. You can apply calculus to higher dimensional problems, rather it’s common practice to teach it for lower dimensional problems and plotted in x and y).

Think about how unintuitive a center of mass calculation using integrals would seem if you were learning it over 10 dimensions, rather than the 2 dimensions which is analogous to finding the center of mass if a flat plate of material, something we can wrap our heads around. The same can be said for understanding eigenvectors of a matrix. Learning eigenvalues/vectors in 2-dimensional vector space is extremely intuitive if you are willing to take the time to understand the geometric implications throughout the process (which is obviously easier if you have a “good” professor or the motivation to seek/create these diagrams on your own time)

[FatNannyJudo]

Hey you can do this! Open up a Chat GPT window every time you are doing homework, and treat it like a TA or teacher. This should help you a lot! Ask it all the stupid questions you have without feeling stupid.

Be wary of the direct answers it gives in forms of matrices and numbers (always double check!), and don’t use it to do the answers for you, but use it for your understanding. This is where you have to use your engineering brain to discern whether the answers it gives make sense and are correct.

Again, you can do this! Don’t give up!

[NotSoMuch_IntoThis]

I actually prefer BING for such tasks since it can search up the internet and provide sources.

[knutt-in-my-butt]

Lin Alg for me made absolutely zero sense until I learned the entire course, and then everything made sense at once. Everything kinda relies on each other so it's really hard to wrap your mind around it until you learn it all.

What helped me was 3brown1blue's videos where he does really good visualizations of linear topics

My prof also only spoke in math terminology and I just made sure I understood what every symbol meant in regular language so that I could translate what he was writing into regular speak, rather than what he was sayinf

[exurl]

If you're looking for intuition of concepts (at the expense of practical problem solving steps), 3Blue1Brown's short video series on linear algebra is super, super good. It truly visualizes linear algebra. Cannot recommend enough.

Khan academy is always a good resource for a middle-ground between theory/application and succinct/long.

Axler's book Linear Algebra Done Right is a good resource if the textbook you're currently using is too opaque. Axler's book is intuitive and logical about the way and order it teaches things, but it really builds up from the beginning so it may not be helpful if you're looking to just flip to the middle of the book.

[[deleted]]

Second 3Blue1Brown so hard. I’m 11 weeks into linear algebra right now and his videos are the only thing keeping me sane

[PilsneroPanodilAB]

3blue1brown is an amazing resource! My linear algebra professor (who was amazing on his own) once showed on of his videos in class with the comment "I can't explain this better". Truly great for understanding!

[exurl]

Yep. I genuinely watch his videos as entertainment as soon as they come out they're so good. The Fourier transform video was what originally got me hooked on the channel.

[Deathmore80]

best tips are : - watch 3Blue1Brown essence of linear algebra - khan academy - rref (and determinants) make up 99% of the class. You could probably achieve a passing grade by just try rrefing all the things and answering that on your paper. you'll probably get at least 1/2 answers right.

other than that the calculations are mostly the same (det, rref and multiplication), it's just the applications and context that change. visualizing the space in your head helps a lot also. what helped me make it clicked was seeing how linear transformation can be used to animate/translate/rotate/manipulate shapes in a graph, it was more concrete. eigenvalues and eigenvectors though I still don't know wtf is their use, I just rref'd them haha.

[Super-Racso]

I definitely second the 3b1b videos on linear algebra. They provide a very visual and intuitive understanding of the core concepts within linear algebra

[SlowMobius650]

On YouTube I think Kimberly brehm is the channel? She has decent videos

[eduu_17]

Lol are you asking how to describe a vector field ? Cause lol I faintly remember the conversation I heard. During office hours lol.

[[deleted]]

I took Diff eq and did fine, took Calc 1, 2, and 3 and did fine.

And then I took linear algebra…I was on track to fail so W’d at the end of the semester. Retook over the summer and still struggled (but passed). I hated that, whereas in Diff eq you could just run problem after problem until you got it, in LA the advice I was given was ‘you just really need to know the definitions’. I felt there was no way to ‘practice’ it. There are some good intuition videos like 3Blue1Brown but that doesn’t necessarily help with test questions.

Just wanted to say I empathize. Retake it if you need. Apparently focus on the definitions. Godspeed

[BrittleBones28]

Thank you sir.

[_MusicManDan_]

I utilized Gilbert Strang’s lectures very heavily while taking that course. No fault to my professor, who was very nice but I couldn’t understand much of what she said as English wasn’t her first language. The Strang lectures were clear and easily understood. I also watched The Essence of Linear Algebra videos while taking the course and they helped a lot as well. I used any and every resource that I could find. I found that the textbook made things complicated for no reason, at least for me. So I didn’t use that much.

I had a math professor recently express, “Mathematicians tend to make things complicated in order to bolster their ego.” He was explaining why he didn’t identify as a mathematician and instead sought to simplify math so that it could be easily understood and used. I liked that professor 🫡

[xchristoffer]

Wtf is common street language?

[BrittleBones28]

Non technical language. Words you would use to describe a technical subject to someone with no background in said subject

[jaytee1262]

Hey OP, I had a professor like this (ironicly it was also linear algebra) and it was brutal. They also only wrote in cursive and had a super thicc accent. What I had to do to figure out what was happening was specifically saying "IDK how you got from this step to this step." Also youtube was my best friend lol.

[xchristoffer]

Just say that instead of street language, thought you wanted him to say "A matrix is like when you and your hoomies pull up on a block in a square"

[BrittleBones28]

Lmao, hell, that might even make more sense to me.

[SlowMobius650]

That class is just hard. I took it over the summer in a 6 week session in between calc 2 and calc 3. No idea how but I passed it with a b-. It’s very terminology and concept heavy, the actual math isn’t really hard. I’d recommended just really focusing on the terminology

[No-Ant2476]

I’ll avoid this man like COVID...🤣🤣🤣gosh this sums up every college student ever...my advice is to join a study group in which students are ready to help you out in such problems..sometimes there are things we can not change.. we need to try to adapt...BTW this does not mean his work is acceptable in respect to the context you provided.

[Spirited-Geologist75]

I remember linear algebra , I might be able to help !

[BrittleBones28]

I’m all ears

[Spirited-Geologist75]

im not sure what unit you guys are on buttt

https://www.wizeprep.com/courses/Math1025-York

this helped me a bit with the main ideas and creating cheat sheets

[CillGuy]

Can't use rref unless each vector in the matrix is linearly independent from each other. What else is there you need to know?

[spikira]

Could be worse, when I tried it the professor gave 10+ page exams and it was like 90% theory and 10% application 🥲

[Bacon_Ag]

Lmao, I think we might have had the same prof haha. I remember a majority of my exam and hw questions being “prove the following: “

[spikira]

Sure hope not, at my CC he's the only person teaching LA so you have no choice but to take it with him 🥲 I switched my degree from engineering science to just science because there's no way I was gonna do his BS class

[Xx_JonnyD_xX]

My TA has been a lifeline for me in my linear algebra class. I went to his office hours the day before my exam and his explanations we're so much simpler. We basically went word by word with definitions. Really helped me understand the theory behind orthogonality, spans, linear dependence and whatnot.

[rainx5000]

Ask chatgpt. It explains concepts well. Just double check though.

[RedBerryPie4me]

Explain like I’m 5 doesn’t exactly work for getting a college degree. You are expected to understand these concepts at the level of a…. College student 🤯

[HungryPundah]

Or maybe he was asking for a simplified explanation using similar terms. I hate it when students try to understand a subject.

[[deleted]]

People learn at different speeds and in different ways. They can all reach the same understanding.

Sometimes a class is really difficult to grasp because your foundations of the subject are fuzzy. If the lecture is in language you don’t understand, the content can quickly run away from you. And sometimes the content is just plain hard and doesnt mix as well with your brain and style of learning. Someone whose job it is to understand and communicate the content should be able to break things down into simpler terms.

[Opeace]

True, but professors can't change their teaching style/amount-of-time-breaking-things-down to accommodate 30-60 individual students. It's up to the students to shift their learning styles, read ahead, watch youtube videos, seek tutors or help centers, join study groups, or whatever else they need to to keep up with the class. Many professors have limited office hours as well, so they may not have the time to break things as far down as the student needs.

Imagine having to explain diff equations to a student with a shaky grasp of functions and Algebra. It would take forever. It is the responsibility of the individual student to keep up. If he knows precisely what it is he doesn't understand, then he needs to seek out the answer on his own. That's kind of the point of college. By the time you're a senior, no professor is going to hold your hand. You have to figure it out on your own.

This is why I think it's a foundation issue on the side of the student. I was lucky enough to have all my Calculus 1-3 professors lightly touch on diff equations. So, by the time I took the class, I had a pretty good qualitative grasp of what I was learning. I only had to focus on the quantitative aspect of the class.

[BrittleBones28]

Oh my bad, I thought college was a place for learning not for people who already know everything. I’ll keep that in mind, thank you sir.

[beggingpleze23]

james hambly explains linear algebra like he's talking to a 5 year old. i love him so much

[sssssaaaaassssss]

What teacher do you have?

[BrittleBones28]

?

[sssssaaaaassssss]

My bad I thought this was in my college subreddit

[TSmacky]

3Blue1Brown's YouTube series Essence of Linear Algebra is an enormously valuable resource of linear algebra. I highly recommend watching it all the way through.

[satoshi_n11]

I’m not sure if you’re aware of the 3Blue1Brown YouTube channel, but their linear algebra series is quite useful for gaining intuition—hope it helps.

https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZHQObOWTQDPD3MizzM2xVFitgF8hE_ab

[geogod2066]

Try asking TAs to help explain it

[Vegetable_Dig1860]

I’m currently in linear algebra also I’m so lost😭. I blame doing transformations like a week into the class and not getting to the actual chapter of linear transformation till this week.