You have to seperate the shape into triangles and rectangles. if you do this, you get 2 identical triangles and 2 different rectangles. one of the rectangles is 8 square cm, the other is 12. you can see that the base of each of the 2 triangles is 3 cm long. 2 halves=1 whole, so the 2 triangles turn into 1 rectangle. therefore, you have to add 12+12+8. That is 32 square centimeters.
