Cyclic Quadrilaterals

Cyclic Quadrilaterals printable sheet
Printable sheets of circles: 9 dot  10 dot   12 dot  15 dot  18 dot

In the GeoGebra interactivity below there is a circle with 9 equally spaced points on the edge, and one in the centre.

Draw as many different triangles as you can, by joining the centre dot and any two of the dots on the edge.



Can you work out the angles in your triangles?

Now draw a few quadrilaterals whose interior contains the centre of the circle, by joining four dots on the edge.

Can you work out the angles of your quadrilaterals?

If you're finding it hard to work out the angles, take a look at Getting Started.

Create at least five different quadrilaterals in this way and work out their angles.



What do you notice about the angles on opposite vertices of your quadrilaterals?

Perhaps you are wondering whether this only happens with 9-dot circles...

You may wish to explore the opposite angles of quadrilaterals on circles with a different number of dots.

Click below for interactivities with 10, 12, 15 and 18 dots around the circle.

10 dots

12 dots

15 dots

18 dots

Extension:

Will the same happen if you draw a circle and choose four points at random to form a quadrilateral?


To prove that the opposite angles of all cyclic quadrilaterals add to $180^\circ$ go to Cyclic Quadrilaterals Proof


Quadrilaterals whose vertices lie on the edge of a circle are called Cyclic Quadrilaterals.