Pythagoras Project –getting the right angle in your chosen field!
For every teacher of Mathematics there is one question that looms menacingly over every topic ––“Sir, has this got anything to do with, you know, ……. the real world?”
The class understood Pythagoras’ Theorem (Of far more use than his less popular ‘Serum’ which many found hard to swallow):
“In any Right Angled Triangle
The Square of the Hypotenuse is Equal to
The Sum of the Squares of the other 2 Sides”
They were able to apply it to find unknown sides or angles but, more importantly, understand that the reverse was also true – provided the 3 sides obeyed the Theorem then the angle opposite the longest side must be 90 degrees i.e. a right angle!
Armed with only a 22.8m tug of war rope, measuring tape, calculator and electrical tape we embarked on the first stage of our project –to check whether the alleged right angles painted on the basketball court were in fact 90 degrees.
But there was a problem! The class had identified that a basic 3 4 5 Pythagorean Triad required the rope be first divided into 12 equal parts. They then proceeded to mark off intervals of 3, 4 & 5 parts but…………….there was some rope left over!
After much re-measuring, recalculating and head scratching the class made the impossible decision to recheck the length of the entire rope in the unlikely event that Mr Hannam’s initial measurement was out. It was true, apparently overnight, the rope had swelled in the heat from 22.8 to 23.1m. The old electrical tape markings were removed, the calculator hummed, and a new set of 3 4 5 dimensions was barked across the basketball court. The tension in the air was palpable as the triangle was pulled out into a triad confirming that the court painters were dead accurate.
Satisfied that we now had an ancient but accurate measuring device, the class took to the oval to stake out a perfectly rectangular field like farmers of old. Thus proving that Mathematics always has a practical application in the ‘real world’, and that ancient property line disputes might have once been resolved in a rigorous tug-of-war!
