The interior angles of a simple convex polygon with sides sum to , a relationship explained by partitioning the polygon into triangles. This understanding supports finding unknown angles in triangles, quadrilaterals, and other familiar polygons, including determining each angle of a regular polygon and checking whether given measures are consistent; exterior-angle sums, self-intersecting polygons, and more advanced generalizations are outside this scope.
For a simple, convex polygon with sides, the sum of its interior angles is
This works because you can draw diagonals from one vertex to divide the polygon into triangles. Each triangle has angle sum .
A pentagon has interior angles of , , , , and . Find .
Step 1: Count the sides.
A pentagon has sides.
Step 2: Find the total interior angle sum.
So, the five interior angles must add to .
Step 3: Add the known angles.
Step 4: Subtract from the total to find .
Therefore, the missing interior angle is
To check, add all five angles:
which matches the interior angle sum for a pentagon.
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