A ladder is leaned up against a house to reach a 10 foot window. The base of the ladder is placed 11 feet away from the base of the house. Draw a image and determine how long the ladder is in feet.

Answer 1

First, draw the picture. You will see that the ground, house wall, and ladder form a triangle. Since the house is perpendicular to the ground, the angle between the ground and house wall is 90° and the triangle is a right triangle with the ladder forming the hypotenuse. Now you can use the Pythagorean Theorem (a² + b² = c²) to find the length of the ladder:

a = distance from house to base of ladder = 11 feet

b = height of window = 10 feet

c = length of ladder = ?