Look at the parallelogram below.
What is its area?
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Look at the parallelogram below.
What is its area?
The goal is to find the area of the parallelogram using the given base and height.
The formula to calculate the area of a parallelogram is given by:
Given:
To find the area:
Carrying out the multiplication:
Thus, the area of the parallelogram is .
cm²
Calculate the area of the parallelogram according to the data in the diagram.
Height is the perpendicular distance between parallel sides, while side length is the actual length of a side. In this problem, height is 4 cm (the dashed vertical line), not the slanted side of 2 cm.
That formula doesn't work for parallelograms! You need base × height because area measures the space inside the shape. The slanted side doesn't give you the true 'height' of the parallelogram.
Look for the perpendicular line (often shown as a dashed line) that forms a 90° angle with the base. In this diagram, it's the red dashed vertical line measuring 4 cm.
You'd get 16 cm², which is wrong! The 2 cm measurement is a side length, not the height. Always use the perpendicular distance for height calculations.
No! The area formula works for any parallelogram, no matter how slanted. Just make sure you use the height (perpendicular distance), not the slanted side length.
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