Question

A student has four sticks of wood that measure 12 inches, 15 inches, 18 inches, and 30 inches. Can the student use three of these to make a right triangle with a hypotenuse of 30 inches? Explain your answer.

Answer 1

No

Explanation

Since the hypotenuse is 30, that means you can use 12, 15, or 18 in any combination to make a triangle, but you are limited to only being able to use two out of the other three. You can use brute force to answer this question.

The pythagorean theorem:

`A^(2)+B^(2)=C^(2)`

and
`30^(2)=900`

there is no combination of these numbers squared that would get you close to 900.