No, 1 square foot is not 12 square inches. In fact, 1 square foot equals 144 square inches. To understand why we can calculate the area in this way, let’s break it down.
First, consider what a square foot represents. A square foot is a square that has each side measuring one foot long. Since one foot is equivalent to 12 inches, we can convert the dimensions of the square foot into inches. Thus, each side of the square is 12 inches.
Now, to determine the area of this square, we need to multiply the length of one side by the length of the other side. In this case:
Area = Length × Width
For our square foot, both the length and the width are 12 inches:
Area = 12 inches × 12 inches = 144 square inches
This means that there are 144 square inches in a square foot.
You can visualize this by imagining a grid made up of 1-inch squares. If you arrange these 1-inch squares to fill a 1-foot by 1-foot square (which is a square foot), you will fit 12 rows of 12 squares. Hence:
12 rows × 12 squares per row = 144 squares
So, it’s clear that the area calculations take into account both dimensions, leading us to find that 1 square foot actually contains 144 square inches, not just 12.