Recall that if two triangles are congruent then they must have the same shape and the same size. This means that they will fit exactly onto each other when one of them is rotated, reflected or translated.
Conditions for congruence 1. SAS (side angle side) Two sides and the included angle are equal.
3. ASA (angle, side, angle) Two angles and the included side are equal.
2. SSS (side, side, side) The three sides are equal.
4. RHS (right angle, hypotenuse, side)
Each triangle is right-angled, and the hypotenuse and one other side are equal.
Corollary 1: A diagonal divides a parallelogram into two congruent triangles.
In the parallelogram shown, the diagonal cuts the parallelogram into two triangles. We can show that these triangles are congruent using SSS.
A Practice questions 8.3
1. Calculate the missing angles in each of the following. Justify your answers in each case. A
(i)
C D 124°
(iv) A 30° D B (v)
112° B C D
(ii) A 100° C D (vi) A C B 144° (iii) A C 149° D C D