Question

Would I have to find the surface area or the volume to the following question- Bryan wants to paint his room a new color. A model of his room is below If he he wants to paint the walls and the ceiling and not the floor, how much space would he need to cover?

Answer 1

You would have to find the surface area

Explanation:

If you had to find something to FILL the room then you would need volume, however, you are working with walls which can be viewed as 2 dimensional, whilst volume is 3 dimensional.

So what you would do is find the surface area of the walls and the ceiling, and then exclude the floor.

If you are given the total surface area, then you need to find the surface area of the floor and subtract it by the total surface area and that will give you how much paint is needed.