Hint #1

The volume of a cube can be calculated as the length of a side, cubed.  That is, for a cube with edges each 2 inches long, the volume is (2^3), or 8 cubic inches.  The surface area of a cube is six times the area of a face, each of which is the square of an edge length.  For a 2x2x2 cube as above, the surface area is 6x(2x2), or 24 square inches.