During this unit in math, we primarily focused on measuring the area/ volume of various shapes, using formulas such as
I decided to work independently on this project because I felt as though it would be feasible for me to work on something like this on my own, maybe even somewhat easier. In the past, sometimes I’ve done a good amount of the project work in groups, and working in groups can be less overwhelming at times, but I wanted to find out how well I cope and accomplish things on my own, especially with math.
I decided to challenge myself somewhat by finding the volume of my living room couch. I noticed, as I studied my couch, that the majority of the shapes involved in my couch’s structure are geometric, excluding the throw pillows. I noticed that the armrests were two long cylinders, the cushions were, for the most part, rectangular prisms, along with the base and the back. I decided not to measure the volume of the throw pillows, primarily because they have pointed corners, and only really have two sides that aren’t flat. I was able to only use measuring tape in order to measure the height, width, and length of each rectangular prism, along with measuring the diameter of each cylindrical arm rest, before calculating the area of the circular base of the arm rest and multiplying it by the height of each cylinder in order to find the volume. I did the same with each rectangular prism, and the back base and pillow sections that required me to subtract a quarter of a cylinder and a smaller rectangular prism. Every calculation is shown in depth in the presentation below. |