Question

FIND THE ERROR Armando and Niran want to draw a trapezoid that has a height of 4 units and an area of 18 square units. Armando says that only one trapezoid will meet the criteria. Niran disagrees and thinks that she can draw several different trapezoids with a height of 4 units and an area of 18 square units. Who is correct? Explain your reasoning.

Answer 1

Niran is correct.

Explanation:

The area of a trapezoid is h(a + b)/2 where h is the height and a and b are the lengths of the opposite parallel sides.

Using the given values:

Area = 18 = 4(a + b)/2

---> 2(a + b) = 18

---> a + b = 9

Now there are many values we can assign to a and b so that they sum to 9 ( for exampl 3 and 6, 4 and 5, 1 and 8)

so Niran is correct.