mathematics

Tatiana Shubin

Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin rather than just read about it. In short: Tatiana Shubin is a Soviet and American mathematician known for her work developing math circles, social structures for the mathematical enrichment of secondary-school students, especially among the Navajo and other Native American people. She is a professor of mathematics at San José State University in California.

Key takeaways

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

Reference excerpt

Tatiana Shubin is a Soviet and American mathematician known for her work developing math circles, social structures for the mathematical enrichment of secondary-school students, especially among the Navajo and other Native American people. She is a professor of mathematics at San José State University in California.

Education and career Shubin is originally from Ukraine, the daughter of a criminologist and a lawyer; she is of Jewish descent on her father's side. When she was ten, her family moved to Almaty in Kazakhstan, where her father had taken a university teaching position. After competing in the All Siberian Mathematics Competition, she was invited to a special science boarding school in Akademgorodok, but after spending the 8th grade there her parents brought her back to Almaty where she finished high school at age 16. She studied for five years at Moscow State University, earning a bachelor's degree there, but was expelled for non-participation in political activities and instead earned a master's degree at Kazakh State University in Almaty. After obtaining a letter of invitation from an Israeli sponsor, she was allowed to leave the Soviet Union, spent nine months in Austria, and then emigrated to the US in 1978, with support from the Tolstoy Foundation. She completed a Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Barbara in 1983, and joined the San José State University faculty as a lecturer in 1985.

Math circles Shubin founded the San José Math Circles. She co-founded the first math teachers' circle in 2006, and is a leader of the Math Teachers’ Circle Network that developed out of this circle. She was a co-founder of the Navajo Nation Math Circles project in 2012, and is a director of the Alliance of Indigenous Math Circles.

Publications Shubin is the coeditor of several books on mathematics:

Mathematical Adventures for Students and Amateurs (edited with David F. Hayes, Mathematical Association of America, 2004) Expeditions in Mathematics (edited with Gerald L. Alexanderson and David F. Hayes, Mathematical Association of America, 2011) Inspiring Mathematics: Lessons from the Navajo Nation Math Circles (edited with Dave Auckly, Bob Klein, and Amanda Serenevy, MSRI Mathematical Circles Library 24, Mathematical Sciences Research Institute and American Mathematical Society, 2019) Her work developing math circles among the Navajo was featured in the documentary film Navajo Math Circles (2016), broadcast on the Public Broadcasting System.

Recognition Shubin was the 2006 winner of the Award for Distinguished College or University Teaching of Mathematics of the Golden Section (Northern California, Nevada, and Hawaii) of the Mathematical Association of America. She was the 2017 winner of the Mary P. Dolciani Award of the Mathematical Association of America. She has been named a Sequoyah Fellow by the American Indian Science and Engineering Society. The Navajo Todích’íí’nii (Bitter Water) clan have adopted her as a member.

References

External links Home page at SJSU

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Tatiana Shubin

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin

In research: Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin 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: Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Tatiana Shubin in simple terms?

Why does Tatiana Shubin 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 Tatiana Shubin?

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 Tatiana Shubin.