Tutorial:Midpoints Quadrilaterals
Problem:Investigate what happens if you connect the the consecutive midpoints
of a quadrilateral.
In this tutorial, we will use GeoGebra to explore what happens if we connect the
consecutive midpoints of a quadrilateral. We will learn to use the following tools:
Move, Midpoint or Center, Segment Between two points and Polygon. You can
follow this tutorial step by step. You can follow this tutorial step by step by opening
the GeoGebra window.
Figure 1 - An equilateral triangle formed by radii of two circles
In constructing our triangle, we are going to learn how to use the circle tool, and
how to display interior angle measure of a polygon and length of segments. Note
that we can also draw a regular polygon of any side by using the Regular polygon
tool.
1 We will not need the Algebra window and the Coordinate axes so we will hide
them. To hide the Coordinate axes, click the View menu on the menu bar, and then
click Axes. To hide the Algebra window, click View then click Algebra window.
2 Click the New Point button, and then click four distinct places on drawing pad
forming the vertices of a quadrilateral.
3 If the labels of the points are not displayed, click the Move button, right click each
point and click Show label from the context menu. (The context menu is the pop-up
menu that appears when you right click an object.)
4 Select the Segment between two points button and click point A and click point B
two distinct points to construct segment AB. To construct BC, with the Segment
between two points tool still active, click point B and another location to create
segment BC. Repeat until ABCD is formed. After step 4, your drawing should look
like Figure 1 below.
5 Click the Move button and move the vertices of the quadrilateral. What do you
observe?
6 To determine the midpoint of each side of the quadrilateral, click the inverted
triangle at the bottom right of the New Point button and choose Midpoint or Center
tool from the list. Click the segments in the following order: AB, BC, CD and AD.
7 Select the Move button, right click the midpoints and click Show label from the
context menu. After step 7, your drawing should look like Figure 2..
8 Move the vertices of the quadrilateral. What do you observe?
9 To have a better view, let us connect the midpoints of the quadrilateral using the
Polygon tool. To do this, click the Polygon tool and click the points in the following
order: Point E, point F, point G, point H and then point E again to close the polygon.
10 Move the vertices of the quadrilateral. What do you observe about the figure?
11 What conjecture can you make based on your observation?
2 Constructing an Equilateral Triangle
Problem: How will you draw an equilateral triangle without using the Regular
polygon tool?
You can follow this tutorial step by step by opening the GeoGebra window.
In this tutorial, we will mimic compass and straight edge construction using the circle
tool. The idea is to use the intersections of two circles and the two centers to form as
triangles as shown below.
Figure 1 - An equilateral triangle formed by radii of two circles
In constructing our triangle, we are going to learn how to use the circle tool, and how
to display interior angle measure of a polygon and length of segments. Note that we
can also draw a regular polygon of any side by using the Regular polygon tool.
1 We will not need the Algebra window and the Coordinate axes so we will hide them.
To hide the Coordinate axes, click the View menu on the menu bar, and then click
Axes. To hide the Algebra window, click View then click Algebra window.
2 Click the Segment between two points tool, and click two distinct places on the
drawing pad to construct segment AB.
3 If the labels of the points are not displayed, click the Move button, right click each
point and click Show label from the context menu. (The context menu is the pop-up
menu that appears when you right click an object.)
4 To construct a circle with center A passing through B, click the Circle with Center
through Point tool, click point A, then click point B. After step 4, your drawing should
look like the one shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 - Circle with center A and passing through B.
5 To construct another circle with center B passing through A, with the Circle with
Center though Point still active, click point B and then click point A.
6 Next, we have to intersect the circles. To intersect the two circles, click the inverted
triangle on the New Point tool, select Intersect Two Objects, then click the
circumference of both circles. Notice that two points will appear in their intersections.
After step 6, drawing should look like the one shown in Figure 2.
Figure 3 - Circles with radius AB and intersection C and D.
7 We only need three points, points A, B and C, to form an equilateral triangle, so we
will hide the two circles, segment AB and point D. To do this, right click each object
and click the Show Object option to uncheck it. In hiding segment AB, be sure that
you do not click points A or B.
8 With only three points remaining on the drawing pad, click the Polygon tool and
click the points in the following order: point A, point B, point C and then point A to
close the polygon. After step 8, your drawing should look like the figure below. Note
that in other versions, or depending on the setting, segment labels may appear.
Figure 4 - Triangle formed from radii of two circles
9 Using the Move button, move the vertices of the triangle. What do you observe?
Notice that you can move vertex A and B but you can never move vertex B. This is
because vertex B is a dependent object. Recall that vertex C is the intersection of two
circles and thus depends on the length of segment AB.
10 You have probably observed that it seems that ABC is an equilateral triangle. In
fact, it is. To verify, we can display the interior angles of the triangle. To do this, click
the Angle tool, then click the interior of the triangle.
11 What do you observe? Move the vertices of the triangle. Is your observation still
the same?
12 You can also verify the length of the sides using the Properties window. To do this,
right click one of the sides of the triangle, click Object Properties from the context
menu.
13 In the Object Properties window, select the Basic tab. Be sure that the Show label
check box is checked and choose Value from the Show label drop down list box.
14 Select the other sides of the triangle in the Object list located at the left side of the
Object Properties window and change the labels to Value, then close the window
when you are done.
15 Prove that the construction above always results to an equilateral triangle.
Tutorial:Square
Problem: How will you a square without using the Regular polygon tool?
In this tutorial, like Tutorial 1, we will mimic compass and straightedge construction
using the circle tool, the parallel line tool, the perpendicular tool to construct a square
instead of using the Regular polygon tool. We will also reinforce the use of the angle
tool, this time, learn how to use it to measure angle using three points.
You can follow this tutorial step by step by opening the GeoGebra window.
The idea of our construction is to construct a circle with radius AB and construct lines
parallel and perpendicular to it to form our square.
If this is your first time to using GeoGebra, it is important that you read Introduction to
GeoGebra. If you want to follow this tutorial step-by-step, you can open the GeoGebra
window in your browser by clicking here. You can view the output of this tutorial here.
In constructing our triangle, we are going to learn how to use the circle tool, and how to
display interior angle measure of a polygon and length of segments. Note that we can
also draw a regular polygon of any side by using the Regular polygon tool.
1 We will not need the Algebra window and the Coordinate axes so we will hide them.
To hide the Coordinate axes, click the View menu on the menu bar, and then click Axes.
To hide the Algebra window, click View then click Algebra window.
2 To construct radius AB, select the Segment between two points tool and click two
distinct places on the drawing pad.
3 If the labels of the points are not displayed, click the Move button, right click each
point and click Show label from the context menu. (The context menu is the pop-up
menu that appears when you right click an object.)
4 To construct a circle with center A passing through B, select the Circle with Center
through Point tool, click point A, then click point B. After step 4, your drawing should
look like the one shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 - Circle with center A and passing through B.
5 To construct a line perpendicular to AB and passing through A, click the
Perpendicular line tool, click segment AB then click point A.
6 To intersect the circle and the line, use the New Point tool and click one of the
intersections. If the label of the third point is not shown, right click the point, then click
Show label. After step 6, your drawing should look like the one shown in Figure 3.
7 Next, we construct a line parallel to AB then passing through C. To do this, select the
Parallel line tool, click segment AB (not the points), then click point C.
8 Now, we construct a line parallel to AC and passing through point B. To do this, with
the Parallel line tool still active, click line AC then click point B.
9 To construct the fourth vertex, select the Intersect Two Objects tool, click the line
passing through B and the line perpendicular to it. After step 9, your drawing should
look like the one shown in Figure 3.
10 Using the Move button, move point A or point B. What do you observe?
11 Next we hide all the objects except the four points and segment AB. To do this, right
click the objects that we are going to hide, and then uncheck Show Object from the
context menu.
12 To complete the square, connect points A and C, points C and D, and points B and B
with the Segment between Two Points tool.
13 To verify that the quadrilateral that we created is indeed a square, right click each
side and click Object Properties.
14 In the Object Properties window, select the Basic tab. Be sure that the Show label
check box is checked and choose Value from the Show label drop down list box. (see
the last figure in Tutorial 2)
15 To measure angle A, click the Angle tool, and click the vertices in the following
order: point C, point A and then point B (or B, then A, then C).
16 In case the angle formed is a reflex angle, right click the symbol (the green sector),
click Object Properties from the context menu.
17 In the Basic tab of the Object Properties window, uncheck the Allow Reflex Angle
check box, then click the Close button.
18 Reveal the measure of the three other angles. Move point A or point B. What do you
observe?
19 Explain why the construction above always results to a square.
