mathematics

Kristin Umland

Kristin Umland is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Kristin Umland rather than just read about it. In short: Kristin Umland is an American mathematician and mathematics educator. She was on the faculty of the Department of Mathematics & Statistics at University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, New Mexico for nearly two decades before leaving to help build the nonprofit organization Illustrative Mathematics (IM).

Key takeaways

Kristin Umland belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Kristin Umland to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Kristin Umland from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Kristin Umland is an American mathematician and mathematics educator. She was on the faculty of the Department of Mathematics & Statistics at University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, New Mexico for nearly two decades before leaving to help build the nonprofit organization Illustrative Mathematics (IM).

Education and career Umland did undergraduate studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. In 1996, she was awarded a Ph.D. in mathematics by the University of Illinois Chicago. Her dissertation, entitled "The Mod-2 Cohomology of the Lyons Group", was supervised by Stephen D. Smith. In 1996, Umland began teaching in the Department of Mathematics & Statistics at the University of New Mexico (UNM). She joined the tenure stream faculty in 2002 and was later promoted to associate professor. At New Mexico, Umland taught a wide variety of mathematics courses, ranging from intermediate algebra to measure theory, as well as courses in mathematics education. She supervised 3 doctoral dissertations and several master's dissertations. After being invited to visit the Vermont Mathematics Initiative by Dr. Ken Gross, Umland was set out to improve K–12 teaching and learning. At UNM, Umland built on her Vermont Mathematics Initiative experience to improve children's learning and achievement. She was program director of La Meta, which was a partnership between the university, Central New Mexico Community College and five New Mexico public school districts. After initially offering mid-grade teachers of mathematics a chance to earn mathematics credit, beginning in 2007, mathematics educators, mathematicians, mentors, and content coaches from the partnership visiting mid-grade classrooms. Umland worked on an National Science Foundation-funded project to evaluate the impact of Math Teachers' Circles on teachers of middle school mathematics. The circles bring together mathematicians and K–12 mathematics teachers. She and her collaborators reported on the effectiveness of these circles, as well as their history, in the Notices of the American Mathematical Society. Umland left UNM in 2016 to work full time as vice president for content development at Illustrative Mathematics (IM), a nonprofit company she co-founded with William McCallum to develop and deliver mathematics content for K-12 teachers. She became chief product officer in July 2019. In June of 2020, Umland was appointed as president of IM.

Recognition In 2017, the American Mathematical Society (AMS) recognized Umland with the AMS Award for Impact on the Teaching and Learning of Mathematics. The AMS cited Umland's work to support the "national K–12 mathematics community in the transition to the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics (CCSS-M)". Umland and IM co-founder William McCallum, together with a community of mathematicians, mathematics educators and teachers developed an open, online resource to assist teachers learn about the core standards and their progression. The award citation reports that "since 2012, illustrativemathematics.org has had over four million visitors viewing tasks over fourteen million times". In 2018, the Association for Women in Mathematics (AWM) honored Umland with Louise Hay Award "in recognition of her leadership and contributions advancing large-scale improvement in mathematics education". The Louise Hay Awards for Contributions to Mathematics Education were initiated by the AWM in 1991.

Selected publications Umland, Kristin (August 1, 2002). College Algebra. Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt Pub Co. p. 450. ISBN 978-0787293765. Sriraman, Bharath; Umland, Kristin (2020). "Argumentation in Mathematics Education". Encyclopedia of Mathematics Education. Cham: Springer International Publishing. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-15789-0_11. ISBN 978-3-030-15788-3. S2CID 213846344. Hill, Heather C.; Umland, Kristin; Litke, Erica; Kapitula, Laura R. (2012). "Teacher Quality and Quality Teaching: Examining the Relationship of a Teacher Assessment to Practice". American Journal of Education. 118 (4). University of Chicago Press: 489–519. doi:10.1086/666380. ISSN 0195-6744. S2CID 54511474. Umland, Kristin (2008). "A reflection on mathematical cognition: how far have we come and where are we going?". The Mathematics Enthusiast. 5 (1): 101–116. doi:10.54870/1551-3440.1089. S2CID 118507428. Retrieved 4 February 2021.

References

External links Illustrative Mathematics

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Kristin Umland

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Kristin Umland claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Kristin Umland before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Kristin Umland ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Kristin Umland

In research: Kristin Umland appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Kristin Umland in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Kristin Umland is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 20th-century American mathematicians, 20th-century American women mathematicians, 21st-century American mathematicians, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Kristin Umland outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Kristin Umland in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Kristin Umland means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Kristin Umland out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Kristin Umland in simple terms?

Why does Kristin Umland matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Kristin Umland?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Kristin Umland.