Calculus textbooks and companions? (Will go on to Calc III and harder maths eventually)

[Mel Belle]

I started taking a calculus course with the Stewart textbook in the fall semester, but had to drop because I went out on a medical leave. However, I did notice that the textbook did not seem helpful to me at all. The pages were plastered with equations, as any math textbook is expected to be, but it was seriously lacking in annotations that actually explained what was going on in the progressive steps. So solely in terms of reading the textbook I was extremely lost. My particular professor had a teaching style that was... interesting. Mostly because he would go on and on about why some particular method was important and its historical significance (or something to that effect) but hardly go over precisely how to do it. Sure, knowing why something is important to learn is helpful, but not if he doesn't teach me how to actually do that thing.

But I digress.

This summer I am taking calculus I and II in order to catch up from my medical leave a bit. I usually don't have a problem with the condensed format of these sorts of classes, but I'm a bit nervous that the same book is assigned at this different school. The professors teaching the two courses have one review each so I'm not prepared to trust those reviews, good or bad.

Any suggestions for alternative textbooks or other types of review books I could use to get me through this summer? If there's a calculus equivalent of Organic Chemistry as a Second Language that would be great haha. I feel I should also mention that I will be going on to Calculus III, Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, and Quantum Mechanics in the future, so this isn't a one and done deal. I'll need to remember this stuff for the future.

Thanks for any input you have!

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[Theafoni]

Stewart Calculus is poorly written imo

This was a good supplement, http://tutorial.math.lamar.edu/

 

[Jack48]

Yeah I wasn't a big fan of Stewart. I only glanced at his chapters briefly during Calc II but even then I noticed a couple (minor) mistakes. It could have been an old edition though.

If you want a more rigorous book to set you up for higher math you should check out Tom Apostol's calculus books.

For linear algebra, my class used Howard Anton, which I enjoyed although I know my professor wasn't the biggest fan of the text.

As a supplement for linear algebra I recommend watching Gilbert Strang's MIT lectures available online. He really doesn't get into the proofs and sometimes uses simple examples but the videos are great to hammer home concepts.

And of course, a little Khan Academy never hurt anyone.