You took this second-order ODE apart into two first-order ODEs in one of the previous homework problems: 1. get highest-order term by itself on LHS: x'' = t - xx' 2. define helper var: v=x' 3. rewrite and stick on helper var eqn: v' = t - xv x' = v The state vector has two variables in it: [x] [v] At t=0, you are told, this vector has the following entries: [x] = [1] [v] [2] t=0 This means that you can calculate the entries of the derivative vector: [x'] = [ 2 ] [v'] [0 - 2(1)] t=0 Here's the Adams-Bashforth (aka just "Adams") formula, from the formula sheet: X(t_{n+1}) = X(t_n) + h/2 [3 F(X_n,t_n) - F(X_{n-1},t_{n-1})] In this problem, X and F are two-vectors. The only hard part now is figuring out what to plug in where. The first step is to recognize that you need two points to fire up 2nd-order Adams-Bashforth, but you're only given one (the vector [x] at t=0), so you need to estimate [v] [x] at t=0.1 in order to use that formula. One way to do that is with [v] forward Euler, or some other single-step method: [x] = [1] + 0.1 [ 2] = [1.2] [v] [2] [-2] [1.8] t=0.1 Now we have enough info to plug'n'chug. In particular, t_{n-1}=0, t_n=0.1, X_{n-1} = [1], and X_n = [1.2], so..... [2] [1.8] X(0.2) = [1.2] + .05 { 3 [ 1.8 ] - [ 2 ] } [1.8] [0.1 - 1.2(1.8)] [0 - 1(2)] = [1.370] [1.591] Sorry the notation got so gross.