One of the things I really love about homeschool is that there is no especial rush to get something done.  That means that when we happen across a problem like this, we can chill out and spend over an hour fooling around with it, solving for every single angle in the diagram in terms of x, and then taking our time solving it, so that it's an exploration of the principals we've been learning.

And, as we were working on it, Chana asked if we can please revisit it in a few days to see if she can do it herself and more smoothly.

And I just have to say, yet again, how astonishing and wonderful it is that Chana enjoys playing around with math like this.  And how having the freedom to leave her alone when she was struggling with math for over three years and then pick it up when she wanted to has given her the delight of enjoying math and the confidence that she is mathematically inclined.

I think in school there is often a rush to get through the curriculum.  And it would probably be fun for students to do challenging problems "b'chevrusa," working it out together.  That's assuming that they aren't petrified and stressed by math.   There but for the grace of homeschooling go we.