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🧪 Science 🔢 Maths and numbers

Geometry

Geometry is a branch of mathematics that studies the forms, sizes and positions of geometric figures. In the picture a teacher explains an exercise to students at a school in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Geometry is a branch of mathematics that studies the forms, sizes and positions of geometric figures. In the picture a teacher explains an exercise to students at a school in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

📖 In short

Geometry is a branch of mathematics that studies shapes, their sizes and positions: triangles, squares and circles, cubes, spheres and pyramids. It began long ago when people needed to measure the lengths and areas of land.

🤩 Did you know?

  • The word “geometry” means “measuring the earth” in European languages.
  • Al-Biruni wrote an important book on circles and chords.
  • Islamic decorations are full of beautiful geometric shapes.
  • The angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees.

🔎 Find out more

🌟 Flat shapes

We draw flat shapes on paper, and they have only length and width: a triangle has three sides, a square four equal sides, a rectangle four sides with opposite sides equal, and a circle is round with no sides.

🔍 Solid shapes

Solid shapes have length, width and height: a cube like a dice, a sphere like a football, a cylinder like a juice can, and a pyramid like the pyramids of Egypt.

💡 Angles

When two lines meet they make an angle. A right angle is like the corner of a book, an acute angle is smaller, and an obtuse angle is bigger.

🎯 Geometry scholars

Ancient scholars like the Greek Euclid studied geometry, then Muslim scholars like al-Biruni and Omar Khayyam developed it and used it to build mosques, domes and wonderful decorations.

📸 More pictures

Geometry
Geometry
Geometry

🧩 Test yourself

1 How many sides does a triangle have?

2 Which solid shape is like a dice?

3 The angles of a triangle add up to ?? degrees.

4 Which picture shows “Geometry”?

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