Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide [Paperback]

Steve Slavin (Author), Ginny Crisonino (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0471386340 | ISBN-13: 978-0471386346 | Publication Date: September 12, 2003 | Edition: 1

Learn geometry at your own pace

What are congruent circles? How do you find the hypotenuse of a triangle? What is the sum of the angles in a decagon? How can you apply geometric equations to your daily life? With the unbeatable study companion Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide, you'll discover the answers to these questions and many more.

This thorough primer presents an easy-to-follow, proven method for grasping the key concepts of geometry. You'll progress step by step through plane, solid, and analytic geometry and then move on to geometric applications for calculus. You'll build your problem-solving skills along the way through detailed examples, reviews, exercises, and answer explanations. The clearly structured format of Geometry makes it fully accessible, providing an easily understood, comprehensive overview for everyone from high school students to adult learners to math mavens.

Like all Self-Teaching Guides, Geometry allows you to build gradually on what you have learned-at your own pace. Questions and self-tests reinforce the information in each chapter and allow you to skip ahead or focus on specific areas of concern. Packed with useful, up-to-date information, this clear, concise volume is a valuable learning tool and reference source for anyone who wants to improve his or her understanding of basic geometry.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

Learn geometry at your own pace

What are congruent circles? How do you find the hypotenuse of a triangle? What is the sum of the angles in a decagon? How can you apply geometric equations to your daily life? With the unbeatable study companion Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide, you’ll discover the answers to these questions and many more.

This thorough primer presents an easy-to-follow, proven method for grasping the key concepts of geometry. You’ll progress step by step through plane, solid, and analytic geometry and then move on to geometric applications for calculus. You’ll build your problem-solving skills along the way through detailed examples, reviews, exercises, and answer explanations. The clearly structured format of Geometry makes it fully accessible, providing an easily understood, comprehensive overview for everyone from high school students to adult learners to math mavens.

Like all Self-Teaching Guides, Geometry allows you to build gradually on what you have learned–at your own pace. Questions and self-tests reinforce the information in each chapter and allow you to skip ahead or focus on specific areas of concern. Packed with useful, up-to-date information, this clear, concise volume is a valuable learning tool and reference source for anyone who wants to improve his or her understanding of basic geometry.

About the Author

STEVE SLAVIN, Ph.D., is the author of many Wiley self-teaching guides, including Precalculus: A Self-Teaching Guide, Quick Business Math: A Self-Teaching Guide and the recently revised All the Math You’ll Ever Need: A Self-Teaching Guide.

GINNY CRISONINO has taught math at Union County College in New Jersey for sixteen years. She is the coauthor with Slavin on Precalculus: A Self-Teaching Guide.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (September 12, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471386340
• ISBN-13: 978-0471386346
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #180,816 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Steve Slavin, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Economics at Union County College, Cranford, New Jersey. He has written over 300 newspaper and magazine articles, and is the author of four other books, including All the Math You'll Ever Need: A Self-Teaching Guide and Economics: A Self-Teaching Guide, both published by Wiley.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide, January 13, 2006

By 

G. Iverson (Manchester, Washington USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide (Paperback)

This review is based on the first chapter.

The authors/editors did a poor job reviewing this book for errors. I checked the publisher's website and they do not provide online corrections. Being a self-teaching guide it contains self-tests, but when the answers are wrong it is very confusing to the learner.

The discussion on trapezoids is confusing because they only illustrate isosceles trapezoids (but just call them "trapezoids" ) this gives the impression at all trapezoids are isoceles with base angles of equal value.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars OK, August 14, 2006

By 

Matachen "Space Tragic" (TX) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide (Paperback)

Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide. This is not a bad text, but as a previous reviewer noted, it does have many errors (and I was also confused by the trapaziod section); on the other hand, most recent high school and college texts suffer from the same lack of craftsmanship. A final complaint is that there is no mention of proofs, which I was hoping to learn. I do like the fact that the book is straightforward and, once you learn how to account for the editing errors, it will give you a good grasp of the practical aspects of geometry very quickly. With this book and a good grasp of algebra you will be more than ready for trig.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, May 26, 2009

By 

Eric Nilsen - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Geometry: A Self-Teaching Guide (Paperback)

Rampant with errors. Mislabeled exercises, poorly illustrated diagrams with bad measurements, plain-old typos, and simple calculations done wrong, often several times in a row.

The truth is, every math book has errors that can appear obvious when it is a rare anomaly, but when the same mistake is made over and over, it just gets confusing. On pages 50 and 51, for example, the area of a triangle is repeatedly miscalculated by dividing the base in half twice (the base should be divided once), which gives what appears to be a valid (though wrong) answer. The arithmetic is correct, but the key concept is completely botched. This is only one example of many I have spotted.

I agree with other reviewers, this is more than simple oversight. For a so-called "self-teaching guide," this is negligent.