Printable · GCSE Foundation · ages 14-16
Geometry and measures worksheet — GCSE Foundation
Fifteen questions across the geometry and measures statements at Foundation tier. Choose the non-calculator filter to rehearse Paper 1, which counts for a third of the marks.
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Geometry and measures worksheet — GCSE Foundation
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- 1.A scale drawing shows a room that is 5 cm wide. The real room is 15 m wide. Write the scale of the drawing in the form 1 : n.
- 2.A parallelogram has an area of 54 cm² and a base of 9 cm. Work out its perpendicular height.
- 3.A rectangular tile measures 4.5 cm by 6 cm. Work out the area of the tile.
- 4.Two straight lines PQ and RS cross at point O. Angle POR = 52°. Work out angle QOS.
- 5.A circular coin has a diameter of 3 cm. Work out the circumference of the coin. Give your answer in terms of π.
- 6.Write down the term for the distance all the way around the edge of a circle.
- 7.A quadrilateral has both pairs of opposite sides parallel and equal in length, but none of its angles are right angles. Which statement about this quadrilateral is correct?
- 8.A car's windscreen wiper blade is 40 cm long and sweeps through an angle of 110° as it wipes the glass. Using π = 3.14, work out the area of glass it wipes, to the nearest cm².
- 9.A sector of a circle has an angle of 90° and an arc length of 15.7 cm. Using π = 3.14, work out the radius of the circle.
- 10.The point (0, −5) lies on one of the two coordinate axes. Write down which axis this is.
- 11.A parallelogram has an area of 84 cm² and a base of 12 cm. Work out the perpendicular height of the parallelogram.
- 12.A party hat is in the shape of a cone with a base radius of 6 cm and a slant height of 10 cm. Work out the curved surface area of the party hat. Use π = 3.14 and the formula curved surface area = πrl.
- 13.A surveyor is marking out field ABCD for a new crop. The plan states that side AB is parallel to side DC, but AB and DC are not equal in length, and sides BC and AD are not parallel to each other. Which term correctly describes the shape of field ABCD?
- 14.Two angles lie on a straight line. One angle is 37°. Work out the size of the other angle.
- 15.Two similar signs have lengths in the ratio 9 : 4. The larger sign has a side of length 14.4 cm. Work out the length of the corresponding side of the smaller sign.
Answer key
- (c) 1 : 300 — First convert both lengths to the same unit: 15 m = 1500 cm. The scale compares 5 cm on the drawing to 1500 cm in real life, so dividing both parts by 5 gives a scale of 1 : 300. A candidate who compares 5 to 15 without converting units gets 1 : 3. A candidate who converts 15 m to 150 cm, using the wrong conversion factor, gets 1 : 30. A candidate who converts 15 m to 15000 cm, again using the wrong conversion factor, gets 1 : 3000. The scale of the drawing is 1 : 300.
- (c) 6 cm — For a parallelogram, area = base × height, so height = area ÷ base = 54 ÷ 9 = 6 cm. 12 cm comes from using the triangle's reverse formula, height = 2 × area ÷ base, which does not apply to a parallelogram. 45 cm comes from subtracting the base from the area, 54 − 9, instead of dividing. 486 cm comes from multiplying the area by the base, 54 × 9, instead of dividing.
- (c) 27 cm² — Area of a rectangle = length × width = 4.5 × 6 = 27 cm². A pupil who adds the two sides instead of multiplying gets 4.5 + 6 = 10.5 cm². A pupil who works out the perimeter instead of the area gets 2 × (4.5 + 6) = 21 cm². A pupil who rounds 4.5 up to 5 before multiplying gets 5 × 6 = 30 cm². The correct area is 27 cm².
- (c) 52° — When two straight lines cross, the angles opposite each other at the crossing point are vertically opposite and are equal. Ray OQ is opposite ray OP and ray OS is opposite ray OR, so angle QOS is vertically opposite angle POR. Therefore angle QOS = 52°.
- (c) 3π cm — Circumference = πd. With d = 3 cm, circumference = π × 3 = 3π cm. A student who uses the radius (1.5 cm) instead of the diameter in the formula gets 1.5π cm.
- (b) circumference — The distance all the way around the outside edge of a circle is called the circumference. The diameter is a straight line across the circle through the centre, so it is a length through the circle, not around it. The radius is a straight line from the centre to the edge, again a length across, not around. The area is the amount of surface inside the circle, a region, not a length at all.
- (c) It is a parallelogram but not a rectangle — Method: match the given properties to the definition of each named quadrilateral. Working: having both pairs of opposite sides parallel and equal in length is exactly the definition of a parallelogram; since none of the angles are right angles, it cannot also be a rectangle, which needs four right angles. Options: 'must be a rectangle' wrongly assumes every parallelogram has right angles; 'must be a rhombus' wrongly assumes equal opposite sides means all four sides are equal, but only the opposite pairs are stated as equal here; 'trapezium' is wrong because a trapezium has exactly one pair of parallel sides, while this shape has two pairs, so it is a parallelogram and not a trapezium. Answer: it is a parallelogram but not a rectangle.
- (d) 1535 cm² — The wiper sweeps out a sector of radius 40 cm, the blade length, through an angle of 110°. Sector area is angle ÷ 360 × π × radius²: 110 ÷ 360 × 3.14 × 1600 = 1535.1 cm², which rounds to 1535 cm². Forgetting to square the radius, using radius instead of radius², gives 38 cm². Using 110 ÷ 180 instead of 110 ÷ 360 for the fraction gives 3070 cm². Treating the 40 cm blade length as a diameter, so using a radius of 20 cm, gives 384 cm².
- (b) 10 cm — Arc length = (angle ÷ 360) × 2 × π × r, so 15.7 = (90 ÷ 360) × 2 × 3.14 × r = 1.57r, giving r = 15.7 ÷ 1.57 = 10 cm. (2.5 cm comes from forgetting the angle fraction and dividing by 2π alone; 20 cm comes from leaving out the factor of 2 in the arc length formula before dividing; 5 cm comes from dividing the arc length by π alone, ignoring both the angle fraction and the factor of 2.)
- (b) y-axis — A point lies on the y-axis when its x-coordinate is 0; here the x-coordinate of (0, −5) is 0, so it lies on the y-axis. "x-axis" would need the y-coordinate to be 0 instead, which is not the case here. "the origin" is the single point (0, 0), not a whole axis, and this point is not (0, 0). "both axes" would only be true for the origin itself, where both coordinates are 0.
- (d) 7 cm — Area of a parallelogram = base × height, so height = area ÷ base = 84 ÷ 12 = 7 cm. A pupil who multiplies instead of dividing gets 84 × 12 = 1008 cm. A pupil who divides the base by the area instead of the area by the base gets 12 ÷ 84 ≈ 0.14 cm. A pupil who mistakenly halves the area first, as if this were a triangle, gets (84 ÷ 2) ÷ 12 = 3.5 cm. The correct height is 7 cm.
- (a) 188.4 cm² — Curved surface area of a cone = πrl. With r = 6 cm, l = 10 cm and π = 3.14, curved surface area = 3.14 × 6 × 10 = 188.4 cm². A student who uses the cylinder's curved surface area formula, 2πrl, instead of the cone's gets 2 × 3.14 × 6 × 10 = 376.8 cm². A student who uses the circle-area formula πr² instead of πrl gets 3.14 × 36 = 113.04 cm². A student who multiplies r × l but leaves out π entirely gets 6 × 10 = 60 cm².
- (b) trapezium — A quadrilateral with exactly one pair of parallel sides is a trapezium; field ABCD has AB parallel to DC and no other pair of parallel sides, so trapezium is correct. Parallelogram requires BOTH pairs of opposite sides to be parallel, but the plan says only AB and DC are parallel. Rhombus requires all four sides to be equal in length, which is not stated here. A kite is defined by two pairs of adjacent equal sides, not by having a pair of parallel sides, so it does not match this description either.
- (a) 143° — Angles on a straight line add up to 180°. Set up 37° + x = 180°. Subtract: x = 180° − 37° = 143°. 53° comes from using 90° as the total, as if the two angles made a right angle, instead of the 180° of a straight line.
- (d) 6.4 cm — The scale factor from the larger sign to the smaller sign is 4 ÷ 9, so the smaller side is 14.4 × 4 ÷ 9 = 6.4 cm. The distractor 32.4 cm comes from using the ratio the wrong way round, 14.4 × 9 ÷ 4 = 32.4. The distractor 9.4 cm comes from subtracting the difference between the ratio numbers (9 − 4 = 5) from the given length, 14.4 − 5 = 9.4. The distractor 3.6 cm comes from dividing the given length by 4 only, 14.4 ÷ 4 = 3.6, without also using the other ratio number.
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