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 cake recipe takes 135 minutes from start to finish. Write this time as hours and minutes.
- 2.A textbook contains the instruction 'Draw AB' and, on the next line, the statement 'AB = 5 cm'. Which statement about the notation AB is correct?
- 3.A triangle has vertices A(0, 0), B(10, 0) and C(5, 12). Work out the area of the triangle.
- 4.p is the column vector with top number 2 and bottom number 3. q is the column vector with top number −1 and bottom number 4. Work out 2p + q, giving your answer as a column vector in the form (top, bottom).
- 5.Triangle PQR and triangle XYZ have angle P = angle X, angle Q = angle Y and angle R = angle Z, with no side lengths given for either triangle. Which of the following correctly describes the relationship between the two triangles?
- 6.A straight transversal crosses a pair of parallel lines. At one crossing point, the angle between the transversal and a parallel line is 118°. Work out the size of the co-interior (allied) angle at the other crossing point.
- 7.Triangle A has a vertex at (1, 2). Triangle A is enlarged, centre (1, 1), to give triangle B, whose corresponding vertex is at (1, 5). Work out the scale factor of the enlargement.
- 8.In triangle ABC the base BC is 10 cm long and the sloping side AB is 13 cm long. The perpendicular height from A down to BC is 12 cm. Work out the area of triangle ABC.
- 9.A tangent to a circle touches the circle at exactly one point, P. Work out the size of the angle between the tangent and the radius drawn to P.
- 10.In kite WXYZ, WX = WZ and XY = ZY (so at each of X and Z, one side from each of the two unequal pairs meets). Angle X = 100°. Work out angle Z.
- 11.ABCD is an isosceles trapezium. The sides AB and DC are parallel, and the two sloping sides AD and BC are equal in length. Angle D is 112°. Work out the size of angle B.
- 12.Two straight lines PQ and RS cross at point O. Angle POR = 52°. Work out angle QOS.
- 13.Write down the mathematical name for a quadrilateral that has exactly one pair of parallel sides.
- 14.Lines AB and CD are parallel. A straight line EF crosses AB at point P and crosses CD at point Q. At P, angle APE = 65°. Angle APE and angle BPQ are vertically opposite. Angle BPQ and angle PQD are co-interior (allied) angles. Work out angle PQD.
- 15.A ramp rises at 30° to the horizontal. Its sloping surface is 4.8 m long. Safety rules say the vertical rise of a ramp must be no more than 2.5 m. Work out how far below that limit the rise of this ramp is.
Answer key
- (c) 2 hours 15 minutes — Divide the total minutes by 60: 135 ÷ 60 = 2 remainder 15, so that is 2 hours 15 minutes. Treating 100 minutes as one hour, a metric-style mistake, gives 135 − 100 = 35, so 1 hour 35 minutes. Subtracting 60 twice to reach the 15 minutes left over, but losing count and recording only one of the two hours removed, gives 1 hour 15 minutes. Writing 135 ÷ 60 = 2.25 and then reading the '25' as minutes, instead of converting the 0.25 of an hour into 15 minutes, gives 2 hours 25 minutes.
- (c) AB means the segment or its length, shown by context — Method: recall the standard convention for a two-letter label such as AB. Working: AB names the segment AND its length; the sentence around it shows which is meant — 'draw AB' means the segment, 'AB = 5 cm' means the length. Options: 'a different symbol is needed' and 'must be written as |AB|' both describe stricter rules than the convention GCSE actually uses; 'AB can only mean the segment' ignores that the same label is also used for the length. Answer: AB means the segment or its length, shown by context.
- (b) 60 units² — Method: the area of a triangle is half the base times the perpendicular height, so choose a side to act as the base and measure the perpendicular distance from the opposite vertex to it. Working: A(0, 0) and B(10, 0) both lie on the x-axis, so AB is horizontal and AB = 10 − 0 = 10. The perpendicular height is the distance of C from the x-axis, which is its y-coordinate, 12. Area = (10 × 12) ÷ 2 = 120 ÷ 2 = 60. Answer: 60 units². The distractors: 120 units² comes from multiplying base by height and forgetting to halve; 65 units² comes from using the slanting side AC, which is 13 long, as the height in place of the perpendicular distance 12; 30 units² comes from halving the base to 5 before multiplying and then halving the product as well, so the halving is done twice.
- (b) (3, 10) — Method: multiply every part of p by 2, then add the matching parts of q. Working: 2p = (4, 6); adding q gives top 4 + (−1) = 3 and bottom 6 + 4 = 10. Answer: 2p + q = (3, 10). A candidate who forgets to double p first, working out p + q instead, gets (1, 7). A candidate who doubles q instead of p, working out p + 2q, gets (0, 11). A candidate who subtracts q instead of adding it, working out 2p − q, gets (5, 2).
- (a) Similar, but AAA alone does not prove congruence — Three equal corresponding angles (AAA) show that the two triangles are similar — the same shape — but says nothing about their size, so it does not prove congruence. They could be congruent, or one could simply be an enlargement of the other; without matching side lengths, congruence is not established, so 'congruent because AAA proves congruence' is wrong. Equal angles do not force equal sides — a triangle can be enlarged to any size while keeping the same angles, so that option is also wrong. Something CAN be said here — that the triangles are similar — so 'no relationship can be determined' is wrong too.
- (c) 62° — Co-interior (allied) angles on parallel lines sum to 180°, so the co-interior angle is 180° − 118° = 62°. 118° comes from treating the angles as corresponding angles, which are equal, instead of co-interior angles, which sum to 180°. 59° comes from halving the given angle. 236° comes from doubling the given angle.
- (b) 4 — The scale factor is the distance from the centre to the image, divided by the distance from the centre to the object: (5 − 1) ÷ (2 − 1) = 4 ÷ 1 = 4. (2.5 comes from dividing the raw y-coordinates, 5 ÷ 2, without first subtracting the centre's coordinate; 3 comes from subtracting the two distances instead of dividing them; 0.25 comes from dividing the distances the wrong way round.)
- (b) 60 cm² — Method: the area of a triangle is half the base multiplied by the perpendicular height, and here the perpendicular height is the 12 cm, not the sloping side. Working: 10 × 12 = 120, then 120 ÷ 2 = 60. Answer: 60 cm². The distractors: 65 cm² comes from using the sloping side of 13 cm as the height, (10 × 13) ÷ 2; 120 cm² comes from using the right two lengths but forgetting to halve, 10 × 12; 78 cm² comes from taking 13 cm and 12 cm as the base and the height and ignoring BC altogether, (13 × 12) ÷ 2.
- (c) 90° — A tangent to a circle always meets the radius drawn to the point of contact at a right angle, so the angle between the tangent and the radius at P is 90°. 180° confuses the tangent with the diameter through P, as if the radius continued in a straight line into the tangent. 45° halves the true angle by mistake. 60° comes from confusing this fact with the angle of an equilateral triangle.
- (a) 100° — In a kite, the pair of angles between the unequal sides are equal to each other. Angle X and angle Z are both between one side from the WX/WZ pair and one side from the XY/ZY pair, so angle Z = angle X = 100°.
- (b) 68° — Method: two properties are needed. Angle A and angle D are co-interior angles between the parallel sides AB and DC, so they add up to 180°; and because the trapezium is isosceles, the two angles on the side AB are equal, so angle B = angle A. Working: angle A = 180° − 112° = 68°, and angle B = angle A = 68°. Answer: 68°. The distractors: 112° comes from assuming that angles B and D are equal, which is the property of a parallelogram, not of a trapezium; 90° comes from assuming that the angles on the other parallel side must be right angles; 248° comes from using the 360° angle sum of a quadrilateral and taking away only the one angle that is given.
- (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°.
- (b) Trapezium — A trapezium is defined as a quadrilateral with exactly one pair of parallel sides. A parallelogram has two pairs of parallel sides, not one, so it does not fit the definition. A kite has no parallel sides at all. A rhombus, like a parallelogram, has two pairs of parallel sides. The correct name is trapezium.
- (b) 115° — Angle APE and angle BPQ are vertically opposite, so angle BPQ = 65°, equal to angle APE. Angle BPQ and angle PQD are co-interior (allied) angles between the parallel lines, and co-interior angles always add up to 180°, so angle PQD = 180 − 65 = 115°. "65°" comes from treating co-interior angles as equal to each other, the way alternate angles are, instead of adding to 180°. "295°" comes from applying the angles-round-a-point fact (360° − 65°) directly to the original 65°, skipping the correct co-interior step. "25°" comes from misremembering co-interior angles as adding to 90° instead of 180° (90 − 65 = 25).
- (a) 0.1 m — Method: the sloping surface is the hypotenuse and the vertical rise is the side opposite the 30° angle, so rise = 4.8 × sin 30°; then compare that rise with the limit. Working: the exact value of sin 30° is one half, so the rise = 4.8 × 1/2 = 2.4 m. The limit is 2.5 m, and 2.5 − 2.4 = 0.1. Answer: the ramp is 0.1 m below the limit. Working out the rise and stopping there gives 2.4 m, which answers a question that was not asked. Dividing by sin 30° instead of multiplying gives 4.8 ÷ 0.5 = 9.6 and then 9.6 − 2.5 = 7.1 m. Treating sine as proportional to the angle, so that sin 30° is a third of sin 90°, gives 4.8 ÷ 3 = 1.6 and then 2.5 − 1.6 = 0.9 m.
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