10 Secret Trig Functions Your Math Teachers Never Taught You

History, Humor, News Clips, Precalculus 1 Minute

Students in trigonometry are usually taught about six functions:

\sin \theta, \cos \theta, \tan \theta, \cot \theta, \sec \theta, \csc \theta

I really enjoyed this article about trigonometric functions that were used in previous generations but are no longer taught today, like \hbox{versin} \theta and \hbox{havercosin} \theta:

http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/roots-of-unity/10-secret-trig-functions-your-math-teachers-never-taught-you/

Naturally, Math With Bad Drawings had a unique take on this by adding a few more suggested functions to the list. My favorites:

Published by John Quintanilla

I'm a Professor of Mathematics and a University Distinguished Teaching Professor at the University of North Texas. For eight years, I was co-director of Teach North Texas, UNT's program for preparing secondary teachers of mathematics and science.

Published

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