View video clips Mathematics in Context curriculum is designed so that lessons begin with a meaningful context and the math is extracted from that context. The context here involves a ladder positioned against a building, what it does, and for whom and when would a ladder be needed. The class moves outside where they help the school janitor position a ladder. By directing the positioning of the ladder, students see and describe how the angles and distances made by the ladder change when the ladder moves from an unstable position to a safe and stable position- underscoring the mathematical focus of this lesson - the tangent ratio.

Back in the classroom, students draw triangles representing the ladder against the wall and examine the relationships amongst distance, height, and angles of the resulting triangles. They discover that the height-to-distance ratio is a measure of steepness affected by the size of an angle. The lesson culminates with students plotting a steepness graph to determine the necessary height-to-distance ratio for a ladder to be safe and stable.