Trigonometric functions

Trigonometric functions are like special toys that help us understand how triangles work.

Imagine you have a triangle. One side is the bottom, and it's called the base. Another side goes up from the base and makes a right angle, which means it's like a corner. This side is called the height. And the last side connects the top of the height to the base, and it's called the hypotenuse.

Now imagine you want to know how big an angle in the triangle is. Trigonometric functions are toys that help you figure that out.

One of these toys is called "sine." Sine is like a button on a calculator, but instead of doing math, it tells you how big an angle is. You press the sine button and tell it what the angle is, and it will give you a number. This number tells you the ratio of the height of the triangle to the hypotenuse.

Another toy is called "cosine." Cosine also tells you how big an angle is. But instead of looking at the height, it looks at the base. When you press the cosine button, you tell it what the angle is, and it gives you a number. This number tells you the ratio of the base to the hypotenuse.

There are a few more toys, like "tangent" and "cosecant" and "secant." They all help you figure out how big an angle is, but they look at different parts of the triangle.

Trigonometric functions are really important because they help us understand how things like waves and sound and light move around. They also help us build buildings and bridges and other really big things that need to be strong and sturdy.