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	Right Triangles are Cool Because of Pythag's Rule

Activity Overview

In this activity, students use the Geoboard to determine the length of the sides of a right triangles.

Before the Activity

Start the Geoboard App and format it

See the attached PDF file for detailed instructions for this activity

Print pages 85 - 91 from the attached PDF file for your class

Activity Downloads:

(file types)

Shaping_MG_Geoboard_Act08.pdf
Shaping_MG_Geoboard_Appendix.pdf

During the Activity

Distribute the page to the class.

Follow the Activity procedures:

Draw a right triangle with leg lengths of 1 unit and draw squares on each side of the triangle

Draw right triangles with the different leg lengths given in the table

Draw surrounding squares and record areas of the squares

Find the relationship between the areas of the squares

Understand the Pythagorean Theorem that states - the sum of the square of the length of the legs is equal to the square of the length of the hypotenuse in a right triangle

Draw a right angle triangle with sides 3 and 4 and find the length of the hypotenuse

Note the length is 5 units

Draw four right triangles with length of legs that are different from those used earlier

Enter leg lengths, hypotenuse length, leg length squared, and hypotenuse squared in different columns

Find the relationship between the leg length squared and the hypotenuse squared

Observe that the sum of the leg length squared is equal to the hypotenuse squared and the Pythagorean Theorem is valid in right triangle is A² + B² = C²

Given the length of the sides of a triangle identify the triangle as acute, right, or obtuse

If A² + B² > C² then the triangle is an acute triangle

If A² + B² = C² then the triangle is a right triangle

If A² + B² < C² then the triangle is an obtuse triangle

After the Activity

Review student results:

As a class, discuss questions that appeared to be more challenging

Re-teach concepts as necessary

Other Downloads