If would help me explain if I break this into two pieces:
First: add the whole numbers 7 + 2 = 9
Second: add the fractions: In this example, because both of the fractions has the same denominator (the bottom number), you can just add the top numbers (numerators) 9 + 11 to get 20/12. Then, you need to simplify 20/12. You do that by figuring out how many times 12 goes into 12 and how much is left over. In this case, 12 goes into 20 one time with 8 left over. So, 20/12 = 1 8/12.
Now you add both of those two pieces together:
9 + 1 8/12 = 10 8/12.
Now you need to take it one step further to simplify the 8/12 part of the answer. 8/12 can be simplified to 2/3 (divide the 8 by 4 to get 2 and divide the 12 by 4 to get 3), so your final answer is:
10 2/3.