Prisms
A cube is also a prism. A prism is any three-dimensional shape with two identical bases. Edges are drawn from one base to the other, or in other words, from the bottom to the top.
To find the volume of a prism, muliply the area of the base by the height. This same formula works for any prism.
Example
How do we know this figure is a prism? The rectangle on the bottom of the box has the same length and width as the rectangle on the top. The bottom and the top are connected by rectangles.
Step 1: Find the area of the base.
Area of the base = length × width \(8 \times 2 = 16\;{\rm{square\;centimeters}}\)
Step 2: Multiply by the height.
Volume = area of the base × height \(16 \times 4 = 64\;{\rm{cubic\;centimeters}}\)
Answer: The volume of the box is 64 cubic centimeters.
What does the volume tell us about the box? If we used cubes that measured one centimeter on each side, we could completely fill the box using 64 cubes.
