“We can make things easier for ourselves if we think of mathematics less as an exploit of intellectual ingenuity than as an exercise in the grammar of a foreign language.”
- from Mathematics for the Million: How to Master the Magic of Numbers by Lancelot Hogben
For those looking to understand math on a deeper level, consider Mathematics for the Million. This book offers insight into the evolution of mathematics’ sophistication and usage alongside humanity’s evolution, deep explanations of the concepts we have invented and used, as well as a helpful mindset to adopt in your next math class.
Admittedly, I haven’t finished this book yet, but I highly recommend reading its prologue available in the Play Store’s free sample, as it’s what hooked me. It has important information on the contents I’ve mentioned, and it includes this inspiring excerpt from The English Grammar of William Cobbett, which explains the importance of grammar to the working class during a time when public schooling hadn’t been widely established yet:
“When you come to read the history of those Laws of England by which the freedom of the people has been secured...you will find that tyranny has no enemy so formidable as the pen. And, while you will see with exultation the long-imprisoned, the heavily-fined, the banished William Prynne, returning to liberty, borne by the people from Southampton to London, over a road strewed with flowers; then accusing, bringing to trial, and to the block, the tyrants from whose hands he and his country had unjustly and cruelly suffered...you ought all to bear in mind that, without a knowledge of grammar, Mr. Prynne could never have performed any of those acts by which his name has been thus preserved, and which have caused his memory to be held in honour.”
- from The English Grammar of William Cobbett, as seen in Mathematics for the Million: How to Master the Magic of Numbers, page 15
Price & Availability: on sale for ~700PHP as an e-book on Google Play as of the time of writing (free sample also available)