How do you draw an isosceles triangle?

Answer 1

One way would be to draw a square and then draw the diagonal of the square. You now have two isosceles triangles.

Another way would be to draw two line segments that intersect at a point. Take a compass and put the point at the intersection and set some arbitrary length to draw an arc. Now draw the arc between the two line segments to "connect" them. Then use a straight edge to draw another line segment between the points where the arc cuts the line segments, thus creating a triangle. The compass has marked off equal lengths along the line segments, so those sides of the triangle are equal. An isosceles triangle has two equal sides. As an extra point, an equilateral triangle is isosceles, but it is a special case of an isosceles triangle.

The later construction method is pretty straight forward (less involved) than the first, but both are 100% correct. And both methods can be accomplished using the classic "compass and straight edge method" from the days of the ancients!