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  • - When you're sitting in a math class

  • and the teacher starts writing some symbols on the board

  • that you might not quite understand just yet,

  • it might be tempting to say,

  • "Hey, why do I need to lean this?

  • "This seems a little bit abstract for me."

  • And to answer that,

  • I'll tell you a story that one of my early advisors told me

  • when I was just starting Khan Academy.

  • This is someone who doesn't come from engineering,

  • doesn't come from science,

  • and doesn't come from mathematics.

  • He's actually a major restaurateur who has

  • a chain of restaurants some of you might have gone to.

  • And he says when he hires people,

  • he thinks about whether they understand algebra or not.

  • In fact, in his mind,

  • he devices the world into people who understand algebra

  • and people who do not understand algebra.

  • And the reason why he told me he does that is he says

  • when people understand algebra,

  • it gives him confidence that they have the critical thinking

  • and analytical skills to tackle

  • pretty much any problem in any domain.

  • And I think that is the practical reason

  • why algebra is so powerful.

  • It's really going to start to fine-tune

  • your critical thinking skills and your logic.

  • And beyond that, it's frankly just beautiful.

  • A lot of the equations you're going to learn,

  • the ways of manipulating equations,

  • philosophers, mathematicians were developing these

  • for thousands of years,

  • and now you get to understand the outcome

  • of their thousands of years

  • of hitting a head against the wall

  • and coming up with these beautiful expressions

  • that are really the fundamental truths of the universe.

  • So when you go into this algebra journey

  • that we're about to start,

  • learn the math,

  • learn the tools you're about to,

  • because it's really a form of expression.

  • It's a form, it's a way of representing

  • pure ideas in the universe and our minds.

  • In these lessons,

  • we're going to talk about some of that history,

  • the origins of algebra.

  • We're also going to think about

  • what is an algebraic expression,

  • and what are things like unknowns and variables?

  • And finally, we're going to really start

  • to build out our toolkit

  • on how do we manipulate these things?

  • How do we speak the language of algebra

  • and utilize these tools to solve everyday problems?

  • So let's start this adventure together.

  • There might be moments where you're

  • a little bit unsure of yourself,

  • or you're a little bit not sure

  • of how one thing leads to another.

  • But trust me,

  • if you go into the content, pause videos,

  • and see if you can solve things on your own

  • before I work through it with you,

  • and then make sure again that you can do it on your own.

  • And I encourage you to go to khanacademy.org

  • and practice these same concepts on the site,

  • where you'll get immediate feedback,

  • to make sure that you're understanding them.

  • Algebra is going to be a powerful toolkit

  • not just for your studies,

  • but for your entire life.

- When you're sitting in a math class

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