## Back from a long break

I am happy to tell you all that I am back  from a long break and will be posting articles from time to time.  It required me two weeks to get a user ID from my University here in Japan. The user ID will enable me to connect to the University’s network and use the internet.

The content of many recent articles of Math and Multimedia have been relatively higher than the mathematics taken by high school, so I plan to tone down a little bit. Although I want to post undergraduate mathematics in this blog from time to time, the main audience is still high school mathematics students and teachers. Therefore, in the next few weeks, I will be writing tutorials on how to solve word problems, a topic that is requested by a lot of readers since this blog started. Solving word problems will include step by step tutorials and tips on how to solve number problems, age problems, mixture problems, etc.

Aside from problem solving, I am also exploring some software which I will share to you in the next few weeks.  I will also provide tips and tutorials particularly about Open Office Spreadsheet.

## The Best Free Math Tutorial Website

If I were to recommend a free mathematics tutorial website, I would definitely choose the Art of Problem Solving. The Art of Problem Solving is a website where students, teachers, mathematicians and math enthusiasts meet online to discuss problems in mathematics.  Shown below is the screenshot of their home page.

The most popular feature of the the Art of Problem Solving website is Art of Problem Solving Forum. I had a firsthand experience with the Art of Problem Solving Forum when I was still studying. Sometimes, I had to seek help for topics that I did not understand or a problem that I could not solve, and the Art of Problem Solving had really helped me a lot.

The reasons why I chose AOPS over other math help websites are listed below.

1. Quick Response. When you ask questions in other websites, it would probably take a long time for them to respond. AOPS Forum, on the other hand, has more than 74,000 members as of this writing.  Since there are many members around the world, there is a very good chance that your questions would be answered immediately.
2. Wide Variety of Topics. AOPS problems ranges from elementary school mathematics to college mathematics.  There are also sections for mathematics competitions such MathCounts, AMC and other well-known contests. College topics include calculus and real analysis, differential geometry, topology and linear algebra and many more.
3. Latex Support. AOPS supports latex coding unlike other websites. Latex is used to embed mathematical expressions such as $c = \sqrt{\displaystyle\frac{a^2 + b^2 + c^2}{3}} \geq \displaystyle\frac{a+b+c}{3}$ on websites, blogs and wikis. If you do not know about Latex, I have created a Latex tutorial here and here.
4. Lots of Problems. AOPS has 1, 673, 927 topics (or problem posts) as of this writing. There are also problem solving marathons (click here to see example) where one post contains hundreds of problems.
5. Own Wiki and Blogs. AOPS has its own wiki mostly contributed by users.  Many users have also registered their blogs in AOPS.
6. Online Math Classes. AOPS has free online classes called Math Jams where classes are conducted synchronously.
7. Math Contests Problem Archives. AOPS has archived mathematics competitions around the world. Some of the famous contests such as the International Mathematics Olympiad.

Art of Problem Solving also offers advanced mathematics online classes and they have published several books.

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