The Cube

This cube is a special type of cuboid or rectangular prism.  If your student does not understand why a cube, is also a prism I highly recommend you go to our explanation first. 

To be comfortable calculating volume and surface area, your child should be comfortable with multiplication as well as addition and applying this knowledge to 2d geometry shapes.

Surface Area of Cube

We know that a cube is made up of six square faces.

Looking at the image to the left, you can see that I am referring to the three measurements as:

  • Length
  • Breadth and
  • Height

We know that a cube is in fact a cuboid, and the surface area of a cuboid is:

2lh + 2lb + 2bh

Because l, b and h are all equal in a cube this equation can be changed to:

2l2 + 2l2 + 2l2

This can be further simplified to:

6l2

Volume of a Cube

Looking at this image, we can see that there are three individual measurements on a cube.

  • Length
  • Breadth/Width
  • Height

However, as with calculating the surface area, we need to take note that even though there is length, breadth and height - in a cube, these measurements are all equal.

The volume is:

Length x Breadth x Height

or to abbreviate it further:

V = lbh Units Cubed

Since l, b and h all have the same value, we can further abbreviate this to:

V = l3

Move from this section on the cube to explore other 3D-Geometric Shapes.

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I am sure you will find all the information and worksheets you need here, however if there is anything you cannot find please don't hesitate to contact me or simply visit the MathMomentumCommunity and join the conversation!

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