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Narrator: In this video, a high school student uses metacognitive
strategies while solving a word problem. By using self-instruction and

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self-monitoring, she actively plans and monitors her work.

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Student: First, I’m going to read the problem. “Mr. Smith, the
principal, is standing on top of the high school. He is looking at a

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tree in the courtyard that is 30 feet away from the school. The angle
from Mr. Smith’s feet to the base of the tree is 43 degrees. Using
this information, determine the height of the high school.”

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So what am I missing? The problem says that the angle from Mr. Smith’s
feet to the base of the tree is 43 degrees. I’ve noticed that, if you

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connect this point to this point, we have a right triangle. So, while
this angle is 43 degrees, this angle right here is a right angle

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that’s 90 degrees.

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There’s a trick that I’m going to use that’s called SOHCAHTOA that you
can use to find the sides and angles in a right triangle.

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The opposite side to 43 degrees is 30 feet, right here. So what do I
need to find? I need to find the adjacent side. I’ll label it with an “A.”

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I look at SOHCAHTOA, and I know that I need to find the tangent,
because tangent equals opposite over adjacent.

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Now all I have to do is plug in the information that I have in order
to find “A.” Tangent of 43 degrees, the angle, equals 30—that’s the

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opposite side—over “A.”

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And I find that 30 over 0.93 equals 32.25. So the height of this
building is 32.25 feet.

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Now that I’ve solved the problem, I ask does my answer make sense?
Given the information from the problem, and with what I know about

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most buildings, 32 feet seems like a reasonable answer.