Before getting to the question on «how to find the area of a trapezoid », first let’s figure out what a trapezoid and an area of a trapezoid are. Trapezoid is a figure with four sides, so it is a quadrilateral, because quadrilaterals are figures with four sides. However, two sides of a trapezoid are parallel and the other two sides are not. Its parallel sides are called the base of a trapezoid, and the other two are called the legs or the lateral sides. So, a trapezoid is a quadrilateral figure with one pair of parallel sides. The distance between the two bases of a trapezoid is height.
Etymology of a Trapezoid
The expression «trapezoid» has been in application in the English language since 1570, from Greek «trapezion» and from Late Latin trapezium, which word for word means a «small table».
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