Question

Trig Ratios Practice 4 9 ? 21 In the above triangle, would you use SINE, COSINE, or TANGENT to solve for the missing side (TYPE IN ALL CAPS)? (ROUND TO THE NEAREST DEGREE The measure of the missing angle is 1 2 3 4 5

Answer 1

We have the following right triangle

We can relate the two legs with the unknown angle (x) by means of the tangent function, that is,

`\tan x=\frac{\text{ opposite side to angle x}}{\text{ adjacent side to angle x}}=(9)/(21)`

So, Would you use SINE, COSINE or TANGENT to solve the missing side? Answer: SINE and COSINE

Because they both relate one leg with the hypotenuse.

Now, let's find the missing angle. From our last equation

`\tan x=(9)/(21)=0.42857`

by applying the inverse function to both sides, we have

`x=\tan ^(-1)(0.42857)`

which gives

`x=23.1985\text{ degre}es`

Then, by rounding to the nearest degree, the measure of the missing angle is 23 degrees