Area of Kite

by Daisy, Jun 30 2023

Introduction

A kite is a special shape with four sides, like a butterfly or a superhero's shield. It has two sets of sides that are equal in length and next to each other.

The space inside a kite is called its area. Besides its four sides, a kite also has four angles and two criss-crossing lines called diagonals. In this adventure, we'll focus on the area of a kite and the magic formula to find it.

The area of a kite is like the space it takes up on a flat surface, like a piece of paper or a chalkboard. A kite is different from a square or a diamond because its sides aren't all the same length. We describe the kite's area using little squares, like inches², centimeters², or meters².

Features of a Kite

The angles opposite its unequal sides are equal, like a pair of twins.
It has two sets of matching triangles that share a side.
The diagonals cross each other at neat 90° angles, like a perfect X.
When the diagonals meet, they cut each other into equal pieces in a perpendicular, or straight up-and-down, way.

The Area of a Kite

Let’s imagine that you want to build a kite to fly high up in the sky. The area of the kite is like the size of the fabric you need to make your kite. The pieces of wood that hold the kite together are like the kite's diagonals. These diagonals are two lines that cross each other like an X, standing straight and tall.

To find the area of the kite, we can use a secret formula that only needs the lengths of the diagonals:

Area of a Kite = (d1 × d2) / 2

Here, d1 and d2 are the lengths of the kite's diagonals.

Practice

Now, in order to strengthen your understanding, you can try to solve the question below, and the answer of this question will be placed at the end of the article.

Q: A pirate found a treasure map, and on the map, there's a special kite-shaped island with buried treasure. To figure out how much space the island takes up, the pirate needs to find its area. Now, the pirate knows the lengths of the two diagonals of the island.

The first diagonal, d1, is 6 metres long, and the second diagonal, d2, is 4 metres long. So what is the area of this kite-shaped island?