Linear Algebra

I have just completed TMA03 on the linear algebra section of the course and I am just in the process of writing up the last question so that I can post it off in the next day or two. I worked on questions 5 and 6 on the train whilst travelling down to see my family in Norfolk. I always book the quiet coach but it isn't always that quiet. I am sometimes confused as to why parents with young children book this coach when they must know that their children are hardly going to be able to keep quiet!

I have enjoyed linear algebra. I wish that they had included another block of it in the course as they have done for group theory and analysis. As such, this was the first time in a few months that I have delved back into it and I seem to be able to manage the questions ok.

The first three questions were straight forward but the latter three required much more thought and were a nice challenge. One in particular on subspaces and dimensions really made me think about the material and I felt that it pushed the boundaries a bit more than some of the other questions. The question on quadrics was just a slog and it is one of those where a simple slip can mess up the whole answer.

I wonder how many students do this, but part of my process for answering the questions is to look for self-consistency in my answers. For example, if I diagonalise a symmetric matrix A, I make sure that P^TAP really does lead to a diagonal matrix! It is a good way of making sure that my answers are likely to be correct.

Now that I have done a good chunk of the TMA's and I have had a bit of a break, I feel ready to go back to the books and start reading again. First off finish the last section of GTB3 on the counting theorem!