Finding the area of a triangle when only a the shaded part and two sides are known

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I tried finding the height of the shaded triangle, which I calculated to be 5. Then I tried solving for the area of the non-shaded triangle, and I got 10 as my final answer. Am I correct?

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1 Answer

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The ratio of the area of two triangles that share the same height is the ratio of the two bases.

We know the area of the unshaded triangle (which is $15$ square units) and the base of the triangle that has that area (which is $6$). As for the other triangle, we know its base length ($4$) but we don't know, and are solving for, its area.

Set up a proportion and solve for the unknown area.

(If anyone has other suggestions or corrections for my solution, please feel free to let me know.)

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