Activity Description Manipulate dimensions of a triangular or rectangular prism, and investigate how the surface area and volume change. Parameters: length, width and height.

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Surface Area and Volume

Place in mathematics curriculum:

• illustrate notions of surface area and volume
• develop students visualization skills
• practice students skills at estimating surface area and volume

This activity allows the user to manipulate three-dimensional polyhedrons to experiment with surface area and volume.

This Java applet requires a Java-capable browser. If the activity does not work, Java may not be functional in your browser or on your machine. This activity would work well in groups of 2 for about 25-30 minutes if you use the exploration questions and 15-20 minutes otherwise.

Preparations for this activity:

• answer the question "What is a prism?"
• discuss surface area and volume
• Define:
  • base of the triangular prism
  • height of the triangular prism
  • width of the triangular prism
  • base depth of the triangular prism