PROBABILITY AND EXPECTATION: IN MATHEMATICAL OLYMPIAD AND COMPETITIONS

In China, lots of excellent students who are good at maths take an active part in various maths contests and the best six senior high school students will be selected to form the IMO National Team to compete in the International Mathematical Olympiad. In the past ten years China's IMO Team has achieved outstanding results -- they have won the first place almost every year.The author is one of the senior coaches of China's IMO National Team, whose students have won many gold medals many times in IMO.This book is part of the Mathematical Olympiad Series which discusses several aspects related to maths contests, such as algebra, number theory, combinatorics, graph theory and geometry. This book will, in an interesting problem-solving way, explain what probability theory is: its concepts, methods and meanings; particularly, two important concepts -- probability and mathematical expectation (briefly expectation) -- are emphasized. It consists of 65 problems, appended by 107 exercises and their answers.

"The reader does not require an IMO future to find this book useful. It is an introductory probability text that can serve as an adjunct to a more detailed text, or a collection of classroom capsules also touching on algebra, number theory, combinatorics, graph theory, and geometry." -- Mathematical Association of America