[catzaa]

> However I've had trouble finding the people who find rote formulas a better way to learn.

Strang's lectures don’t just give you rote formulas. Most of his lectures he clearly shows you where things came from (i.e. how and why Matrix Elimination works, etc...). One of the reasons why he shows the different ways to multiply matrices in this lecture is because he uses it in subsequent lectures to show how null-spaces and column spaces work.

His lectures are not the be-all and end-all to linear algebra, but (IMHO) it gives you a great intuitive feel for linear algebra. Also remember that his particular course (18.06) is focussed on engineering students who tend to do less theoretic proofs than maths and natural sciences folk.

I personally like to get an intuitive understanding of how things work before delving into theory (maybe it is just me). I am currently (slowly) busy with a textbook called Linear Algebra (by Friedberg, Insel and Spence). This is a great textbook that shows you how matrices are defined from fields, etc… (i.e. theoretical). Yet it would be extremely difficult to understand without having an intuitive idea that Strang’s lectures give you.