Plot Points in Polar Coordinates

An interactive tutorial on how to plot points given by their polar coordinates. This tutorial also help in gaining a deeper understanding of polar coordinates and may be used with another tutorial on Graphing Polar Equations. Free polar graph paper is available.

Interactive Tutorial Using Java Applet

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1 - Click on the button above "click here to start" to start the applet and maximize the window obtained.

2 - To plot a point given by its polar coordinates, enter the radial coordinate r and the angular coordinate t (in degrees) and press "plot". To delete all points plotted press "delete all".

3 - Plot points with radial coordinate r constant. Examples: (2 , 45) , (2 , 120) , (2 , 720) , (2 , -900). Change r and start again. What do you notice?

4 - Plot points with angular coordinate t constant. Examples: (3 , 45) , (4 , 45) , (-2 , 45) , (-5 , 45). Change t and start again. What do you notice?

5 - Plot the pair of points: (3 , 120) and (-3 , 120). What do you notice?

6 - Plot the pair of points: (4 , -30) and (-4 , -30). What do you notice?

7 - Repeat plotting pairs of the form (r , t) and (-r , t) and explain the positions of the points.

8 - Plot the points (3 , 45) , (3 , 405) , (3 , 765) , (3 , -315). Explain the position of these points.



More references on polar coordinates.