Students learn about four types of angles: adjacent, vertical, supplementary, and complementary. They explore the relationships between these types of angles by folding paper, measuring angles with a protractor, and exploring interactive sketches.Key ConceptsAdjacent angles are two angles that share a common vertex and a common side, but do not overlap. Angles 1 and 2 are adjacent angles.Supplementary angles are two angles whose measures have a sum of 180°. Angles 3 and 4 are supplementary angles. Complementary angles are two angles whose measures have a sum of 90°. Angles 5 and 6 are complementary angles. Vertical angles are the opposite angles formed by the intersection of two lines. Vertical angles are congruent. Angles 1 and 2 are vertical angles. Angles 3 and 4 are also vertical angles.Goals and Learning ObjectivesMeasure angles with a protractor and estimate angle measures as greater than or less than 90°.Understand the definition of vertical, adjacent, supplementary, and complementary angles.Explore the relationships between these types of angles.

This is a lesson to help introduce types of angles and their measures. With this lesson, students are provided new information and then given the opportunity to practice that new information through note-taking, exploration, creation, movement, and song. 

For this online interactive, students are shown an image of an angle and a protractor to find the measure of the highlighted angle.

This classroom activity helps students understand how the angle of the Sun affects temperatures around the globe. After experimenting with a heat lamp and thermometers at differing angles, students apply what they learned to explain temperature variations on Earth. The printable six-page handout includes a series of inquiry-based questions to get students thinking about what they already know about temperature patterns, detailed experiment directions and a worksheet that helps students use the experiment results to gain a deeper understanding of seasonal temperature changes and why Antarctica is always so cold.

A park ranger needs to build a zipline to drop food supplies to her mentor park ranger at the bottom of a gorge. Unfortunately, she does not have the instructions to build the zipline according to the proper specifications. Without directions, she is unsure of the correct angles to attach her zipline to each tree. Additionally, she needs to figure out how to open the chute to drop the food supplies. Challenge: Create a zip line that will release from her bucket (paper cup) the food supplies (represented by a marble) onto the target (placed 5/8 of the way down the zipline) before the gear reaches the opposite end of the zip line.