Warm Up

 

A. Areas of Composite Figures

Finding the area of a composite figure often involves identifying the shapes that make up that figure and then finding each of their individual areas. Then, it is sometimes necessary to add or subtract some of these areas to determine the total area of the given figure.

Example 1

Determine the area, to the nearest tenth, of the shaded region in the diagram provided.

The diameter of the circle is also the length of the side of the square. So, the square's dimensions are 5 dm by 5 dm.

The formula for the area of the shaded region is
area of shaded region = area of square – area of circle.