NRICH: Painted Cube
Imagine a large cube made from small red cubes being dropped into a pot of yellow paint. How many of the small cubes will have yellow paint on their faces?
Imagine a large cube made up from 27 small red cubes.
Imagine dipping the large cube into a pot of yellow paint so the whole outer surface is covered, and then breaking the cube up into its small cubes.
How many of the small cubes will have yellow paint on their faces?
Will they all look the same?
Now imagine doing the same with other cubes made up from small red cubes.
What can you say about the number of small cubes with yellow paint on?
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Age 14 to 16
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Resource k12
Imagine a large cube made from small red cubes being dropped into a pot of yellow paint. How many of the small cubes will have yellow paint on their faces?
Imagine a large cube made up from 27 small red cubes.
Imagine dipping the large cube into a pot of yellow paint so the whole outer surface is covered, and then breaking the cube up into its small cubes.
How many of the small cubes will have yellow paint on their faces?
Will they all look the same?
Now imagine doing the same with other cubes made up from small red cubes.
What can you say about the number of small cubes with yellow paint on?
Click here for a poster of this problem.
Age 14 to 16
Click here for a poster of this problem.
NRICH provides thousands of free online mathematics resources for ages 3 to 18, covering all stages of early years, primary and secondary school education – completely free and available to all.
Do you enjoy thought-provoking questions? If so, this is the place for you.
What are you looking for?
Organization
Website URL
Type of Resource
PDF File
