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Course: Digital SAT Math > Unit 5
Lesson 2: Congruence, similarity, and angle relationships: foundationsCongruence and similarity — Basic example
Watch Sal work through a basic congruence and similarity problem.
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- Really difficult way, If we know that the triangles are similar we could,
Divide DE by BA =x..and then we Multiply X by BC
Like this...
7.5/2.5 = 3
3 multiply 2.1=6.3= CE(54 votes)- that's what I did as soon as I saw the problem and then as he was solving it I was like whaaat why is he making this so hard(36 votes)
- the part where sal said "if some these sound like greek to you but you are not greek"😂😂😂😂(23 votes)
- An Indian student will solve something like this, as ABC ~ DEC, Now we can use corresponding parts to write something like this :-
AB/DE = BC/EC = AC/DC
Now we need only EC or CEO, and we are given with AB, DE and BC, so we will takeAB/DE = BC/EC
and put the values in like
2.5/7.5 = 2.1/CE and now do your calculation by cross multiplying and wohhoo, u have your answer :)(21 votes) - So if I knew about transversals and parallel lines before this video I am greek? nice(9 votes)
- har har hr har har har hr har har harrrr(7 votes)
- look up Thales theorem if you want an easier explanation for this(5 votes)
- there ain't no diagram at left.(1 vote)
- True! With the double negative, you are saying that there is in fact a diagram at the left ;)(8 votes)
- What does congruent mean?(2 votes)
- For the purposes of the SAT, if two angles, line segments, shapes, etc. are congruent, they are the same size and shape. Corresponding angle measures and side lengths are equal.(4 votes)
- Is punning even a real word?(2 votes)
- Punning is a word.
Punning: making or involving a pun or play on words
So, yes, it is.(3 votes)
- i need to pass my sat :((3 votes)
Video transcript
- [Instructor] In the diagram at left, I'd wrote up here above
or I pasted it up here, line segment AD intersects BE, and line segment AB, AB is parallel to DE. What is the length of side CE? So we wanna figure out the length of side, we wanna figure out the length of side CE. Now it might jump out at you, at least it looks like it,
immediately that triangle, the small triangle on the
left is going to be similar to this larger triangle on the right. But let's feel good
about that, let's prove that to ourselves. And to help ourselves
prove that we're gonna remind ourselves that
AB is parallel to DE. And actually to think
about that even more, I'm gonna, I'm gonna
make, I'm gonna extend these segments a little
bit so that you can really start to see that they are parallel lines, and that we have a transversal, or we have two transversals that
intersect those parallel lines. All right, and I could keep if I wanted to extend this as a
line, I could keep going in both directions. But the bottom line, not to be funny about it, is that these
two things are parallel. That is parallel to that,
and that's going to help us establish that these two
triangles are, that these two triangles are similar. Well the first thing we
know is look this angle, is vertical, is a vertical
angle with this angle, so they're going to be congruent. This angle right over here, if you view segment BE as a transversal
of the two parallel lines, that, that right over
there is going to be an alternate interior angle, this is going to be an alternate interior
angle to this angle right over here. These are alternate interior,
alternate interior angles, so they're going to be congruent. If some of this sounds like Greek to you and you are not Greek, I encourage you to watch the videos on
Khan Academy of angles, of transversals, and parallel lines. And by the same argument, if we look at AD as a transversal, this angle right over, well let me do that in a different color, this angle, this angle right over here, is an alternate interior
angle with this one, so they're going to be congruent. But the whole point of
everything I just did is to say look, the three angles here are congruent to the three angles here, so these must be similar triangles. And the reason why that's useful, is because if they two
triangles are similar then the ratio between corresponding sides is going to be the same. So for example, the ratio of side CE, so we could say the
ratio, the ratio of CE, of the length of segment
CE to say, to say this side right over here, so side segment ED, which has length 7.5, is going to be equal to the ratio of the
corresponding side to CE. Here look CE is a side
opposite this green angle, so if you go on this similar triangle, opposite to this green
angle, that's segment BC. So it's going to be equal to the ratio of the corresponding sides, so 2.1, and the other triangle
to the corresponding side of DE in the other triangle. And this side the
opposite this blue angle, this, this, one of the vertical angels right over here. So the corresponding side over here is going to be side BA. So this is going to be over 2.5. So what would CE be equal to? Well multiple ways to solve this, but one way we could just
multiply both sides by 7.5, multiply both sides by 7.5. Now what's 7.5 divided by 2.5? Well 75 divided by 25 would be three, so 7.5 divided by 2.5 is three. So this is going to be three, so length of segment
CE is 2.1 times three. So the length of segment CE is going to be, what is that 6.3. And if we look down here,
we see that that is indeed, that is indeed one of the choices.