Zoom Tool

Pre-Algebra · Axiom Academy

A magnifying glass for shapes: pick a center, pick a scale factor, and watch every distance stretch or shrink by that same amount — while the shape itself stays exactly the same shape. Blowing a shape up — without bending it A magnifying glass makes things bigger, but it never warps them: a square stays square, a face stays the same face. In math that move has a name — a dilation — and the surprising part is how clean the rule is. Pin one point as the center, pick a number, and every single distance from that point gets multiplied by it. Watch the triangle grow from the center. Each corner doesn't wander — it slides straight out along the dashed ray from the center, and it lands exactly twice as far out as it started. Every side ends up 2× as long, so the triangle is bigger but unmistakably the same triangle. The center stays put; everything else moves away from it in proportion. That's a dilation. One dial: bigger above 1, smaller below 1 Slide the scale factor k . Push it past 1 and the triangle enlarges; pull it below 1 and it shrinks — but it's always the same shape, just resized. Keep an eye on the readout: whatever k you pick, the new base is exactly k times the original base. new length = k × old length — the one rule behind every enlargement and reduction. Why it's still the same shape: the angles never move

This is the written version of the interactive lesson above. See the full Pre-Algebra course.