| CLEARLY | I don't want to write down all the "in between" steps. |
| TRIVIAL | If I have to show you how to do this, you're in the wrong class. |
| OBVIOUSLY | I hope you weren't sleeping when we discussed this earlier, because I refuse to repeat it. |
| RECALL | I shouldn't have to tell you this, but for those of you who erase your memory tapes after every test... |
| WLOG (Without Loss Of Generality) | I'm not about to do all the possible cases, so I'll do one and let you figure out the rest. |
| IT CAN EASILY BE SHOWN | Even you, in your finite wisdom, should be able to prove this without me holding your hand. |
| CHECK or CHECK FOR YOURSELF | This is the boring part of the proof, so you can do it on your own time. |
| SKETCH OF A PROOF | I couldn't verify all the details, so I'll break it down into the parts I couldn't prove. |
| HINT | The hardest of several possible ways to do a proof. |
| BRUTE FORCE (AND IGNORANCE) | Four special cases, three counting arguments, two long inductions, "and a partridge in a pair tree." |
| SOFT PROOF | One third less filling (of the page) than your regular proof, but it requires two extra years of course work just to understand the terms. |
| ELEGANT PROOF | Requires no previous knowledge of the subject matter and is less than ten lines long. |
| SIMILARLY | At least one line of the proof of this case is the same as before. |
| CANONICAL FORM | 4 out of 5 mathematicians surveyed recommended this as the final form for their students who choose to finish. |
| TFAE (The Following Are Equivalent) | If I say this it means that, and if I say that it means the other thing, and if I say the other thing... |
| BY A PREVIOUS THEOREM | I don't remember how it goes (come to think of it I'm not really sure we did this at all), but if I stated it right (or at all), then the rest of this follows. |
| TWO LINE PROOF | I'll leave out everything but the conclusion, you can't question 'em if you can't see 'em. |
| BRIEFLY | I'm running out of time, so I'll just write and talk faster. |
| LET'S TALK THROUGH IT | I don't want to write it on the board lest I make a mistake. |
| PROCEED FORMALLY | Manipulate symbols by the rules without any hint of their true meaning (popular in pure math courses). |
| QUANTIFY | I can't find anything wrong with your proof except that it won't work if x is a moon of Jupiter (Popular in applied math courses). |
| PROOF OMITTED | Trust me, It's true. |