Lesson Plan: Parallel Lines in a Triangle Mathematics
This lesson plan includes the objectives, prerequisites, and exclusions of the lesson teaching students how to find missing lengths in a triangle containing two or three parallel lines using proportionality.
Objectives
Students will be able to
- recognize when parallel lines inside or outside triangles create similar triangles (sometimes called the side splitter theorem),
- use proportionality to find unknown lengths in triangles containing parallel lines,
- solve multistep problems involving triangles containing parallel lines,
- prove that a straight line is parallel to one side of a triangle due to having proportional parts (the inverse of the theorem).
Prerequisites
Students should already be familiar with
- properties of parallel lines,
- properties of similarity.
Exclusions
Students will not cover
- general triangle similarity where two similar triangles are given and similarity is used to determine unknowns.
