Copy of Discovering Sine, Cosine, and Tangent in Right Triangles
Use the slider and point D to figure out how sin(A), cos(A), and tan(A) are related to a, b, and c and to the size of the triangle. Record your observations in an organized table.
Write out rules that you could use to find the sine, cosine, and tangent of any acute angle in a right triangle. Include a diagram.
Rules
1. The acute angle is always going to be a or b, never the c angle, since the c angle is 90 degrees.
2.To find the sine for the acute angle, you divide the opposite side of the angle over the hypotenuse.
3.To find the cosine, you divide the adjacent side over the hypotenuse.
4. To find the tangent, you divide the opposite side of the acute angle over the adjacent side.