"Understand the problem. What kind of problem is it? There are three main types of problems: ‘Show that ...’ or ‘Evaluate ...’ questions, in which a certain statement has to be proved true, or a certain expression has to be worked out; ‘Find a...’ or ‘Find all...’ questions, which requires one to find something (or everything) that satisfies certain requirements; ‘Is there a ...’ questions, which either require you to prove a statement or provide a counterexample (and thus is one of the previous two types of problem)."
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Educators from the United StatesBloggers from the United StatesMathematicians from the United StatesMathematicians from ChinaMathematicians from Australia
Original Language: English
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Solving Mathematical Problems (2nd ed., 2006) Ch. 1, Strategies in problem solving.
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Terence_Tao
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Terence Tao
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