free books on Amazon

Besides Prime Reading, Amazon also offers free kindle books available for purchase (can you purchase something that's free?).

Here's one way to do it.

From the left of the search bar (on Amazon's web page), select "Books" from the drop-down box.

Click on the search icon (the magnifying glass).

Select the category you're interested in (in the horizontal band titled "Shop by Category").  (You could also select the category under Books in the left column.  There's more categories that way.)

Select Kindle Edition under Refine by ... Format in the left column.

Then choose Sort by: Price: Low to High in the drop-down box at the top right.

Scroll down and look.

Some books are free with a Kindle Unlimited membership.  But others are free unconditionally.

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How about finding Prime Reading on the website?

Select Books.  Click on the search icon.

Select Prime Reading under Kindle & Audible in the left column.

It'll present a number of recommended books.

For more, click on Browse the catalog link.  Then you can choose further from a number of categories in the left column, though there's not as many choices as with the Kindle Edition books.  (But after clicking on category, you're presented with a number of sub-categories.)

photomath

Need a little help getting through your next big math exam? MicroBlink has an app that could help you study more effectively -- perhaps too effectively. Its newly unveiled PhotoMath for iOS and Windows Phone (Android is due in early 2015) uses your smartphone's camera to scan math equations and not only solve them, but show the steps involved.

Officially, it's meant to save you time flipping through a textbook to check answers when you're doing homework or cramming for a test. However, there's a concern that this could trivialize learning -- just because it shows you how to solve a problem doesn't mean that the knowledge will actually sink in. And if teachers don't confiscate smartphones at the door, unscrupulous students could cheat when no one is looking.

[via facebook]

Khan Academy

Imagine if you could go online and find a math, science or economics tutor that could help you get your daughter through a high school trig equation or your son to master a college finance course. Envisage also that this would be presented in a clear, concise and even entertaining manner. Naturally it would be free of charge.

Well, folks, look no more. Welcome to the Khan Academy.

Working out of his home in Silicon Valley, Salman Khan, a former hedge fund analyst, could be transforming the way people all over the world will learn math and other subjects.

Khan, an MIT math and science grad with an MBA from Harvard, was doing very well at his employer's hedge fund but got hooked on education after he helped one of his cousins, a seventh-grader who was having trouble with math.

He tutored her online with a blackboard on the screen. That led him to eventually place math lessons on YouTube. It didn't take long before he was a worldwide phenomenon. (See www.youtube.com/watch?v=po3DAsr6mDE)

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[8/26/10] Bill Gates' favorite teacher

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Here's one way to keep you mind sharp (for free).  Learn math at the Khan Academy.