EARLY EXPLANATION

In the early stage, you should use explanation texts to talk and write about your personal experiences
and concrete knowledge.

You can use this text both in spoken and written form, it means you can explain something while you
talk to somebody and you can explain something to somebody by write an explanation text.

The subject of this explanation texts usually concerns with science, technology and social science.

What you need to remember is, explanation texts are generally 'dense' texts; that is, they condense a lot
information into brief explanatory sequences.

You will find it difficult if you don't have a comprehensive understanding on the relevant process of
subject that you want to explain.

GRAMMATICAL FEATURES OF EXPLAINING

1. Nouns are general rather than specific. Because Explanation texts usually talk about particular
process which comprised of group of things.
Cars, Schools, Computer, Smartphone, Germination
2. Verbs used in Explanation Texts usually in the present form, unless those group of things are no
longer exists or obsolete.
Dinosaurs, Floppy Disk, VCRs, Library card catalogues, etc.
3. Tenses used in Explanation Text can be in the present, past, and future if the text deals with
specific things such as particular events and concepts.
E.g. This is my smartphone. I brought it in the early of this year. However, since I have a
commitment to not become ‘a good consumer’, so I will use this for 5 years forth without any
compromises to annual-released of smartphone, except there are serious problem on the
hardware.
4. Processes or verbs are used to explain things. One process or verb is linked to another process
or verb in a way that comprises a logical sequence. Therefore, the verbs follow the cyclical
process that lead to the final result. The example below is an explanation of how a DSLR camera
works. Here, the verbs (italic) are sequenced temporally and causally.

When you press the button to take a photograph with a digital camera, an aperture opens
at the front of the camera and light streams in through the lens. This incoming "picture"
hits the image sensor chip, which breaks it up into millions of pixels. The sensor measures
the colour and brightness of each pixel and stores it as a number.
5. In common-sense and technical explanations action verbs are mainly used, as instances, burns,
hits, expands, forces, breaks, streams, etc., while in interpretative explanation mental verbs may
be used, for instance, reflect, think, suggest,
6. Connectives are generally required in Explanations. Connectives are words that join the verbs/
processes together so that they logically indicate sequences that are temporal. As instances words
like when, then, first, after this.
7. Personal and demonstrative pronouns are also an important feature of Explanations. Those help
to maintain the thematic cohesion of the text.

STRUCTURE OF EXPLANATIONS

Explanation Texts specifically deal with the processes involved in understanding and making explicit the
how and/or why of particular phenomena, events and concepts. The description below explains you
about two different structures of Explanation Texts.
1. PERSONAL AND COMMONSENSE EXPLANATIONS
For explanation text that concern with personal descriptions, personal and common-sense
explanation, the organisation of the texts is not formal as in scientific or technical explanations.
However, general classification and description of the phenomenon, event, or concept are always
put in the first.

This is my new smart-phone. It has Description

incorporated with a very rapid fingerprint-
scanner technology.

Anytime I want to unlock the phone, I just Explanatory Sequence

move my finger over the scanner. As the
sensor detects my fingerprint then it unlocks
my phone quickly.

In the example above, the writer begins the writing with a description of a new smart-phone
which has a very rapid fingerprint-scanner feature. The writer then proceeds to explain how the
stuff works. This constitutes the second structural feature of an explanation text which is the
explanatory sequence. Explanatory sequences are constituted of processes/verbs arranged in a
logical order that tell how, why and often they combine both how and why. The writer has
arranged the verbs/processes in the explanatory sequence as follows:

I just move my finger over the scanner

As the sensor detects my fingerprint
It unlocks my phone quickly.

As the readers read the text, they will have a clear idea from the writer’s personal explanation
about how the fingerprint-scanner works.

2. SCIENTIFIC/TECHNICAL EXPLANATIONS
Scientific and technical explanations are text types commonly used to introduce the areas of
science and technology, and mathematics.
As described before, explanations generally begin with an introductory paragraph that contains
a classification and description, then followed by an explanatory sequence. The text below
demonstrates the role these features play in the explanation of scientific phenomena.
Flotation

Flotation is a technical term that deals with Description

the degree objects stay on the surface or sink Stage
in stage liquids. Objects that float are said to
be buoyant.
When a solid object is placed in a liquid it is Causal
forced up by the density of the liquid. If the explanatory
density of the solid is greater than the density sequence
of the liquid then the solid will sink. If the
density of the solid is less than the density of
the liquid then the object will float. That is
why objects water and why heavy objects like
rocks will sink.
You can see in the explanation text above, on the introductory paragraph the writer classifies and
describes the particular phenomenon which h/she want to explain.
1. h/she classifies the phenomenon or concept as a part of a particular group of things; as
instance,
Flotation is a technical term ….
2. The writer then describes the phenomenon or concept in relation to other things within the
same network; as instance,
Objects that float are said to be buoyant.
3. The writer also describes essential features or uses that are relevant to the subsequent
explanatory sequence;
... a technical term that deals with the degree objects stay on the surface or sink in liquids.
Objects that float are said to be buoyant.

Once the phenomenon or concept has been situated in this scientific frame, the explanation
moves into the explanatory sequence stage. In this phase, the explanations are constituted of
the sequencing of verbs arranged either temporally or casually, or in combinations of these; for
example,

Is placed… forced… sink… float…

In general, explanatory sequences follow a pattern of two or three verbs, followed by a brief
description/evaluation, followed by another sequence of verbs, and so on. This is more
thoroughly explained in the explanation of The Life-cycle of bees below.

The Life-Cycle of Bees

Bees are social insects that live in large groups

called colonies. Of all the insects, only bees,
ants, wasps and termites take care of their
families. All bees in a colony have special jobs
and social responsibilities. Colonies of bees
live in well-organised places called hives.
Description
There are three types of bees in a colony: a stage
queen, the female workers and the male
drones. The queen bee produces eggs which
are cared for by the female worker bees. In a
hive there are thousands of worker bees, a few
dozen drones and only one queen. The male
drones have only one job in a hive – to mate
with the queen.
Sequenced
When a new queen hatches from her queen explanation
cell, she must mate with a drone who provides (mating)
millions of tiny sperm cells that the queen bee
stores in a special pouch in her body. Just
before she lays new eggs, she fertilises each
one with a sperm cell, so that it can develop
into a new worker.
Sequenced
The egg laid by the queen is so small that it is explanation
barely visible. Three days after it is laid it (larva)
hatches into a white larva. A few minutes after
the larva has hatched, a worker appears at the
cell to feed it a special food called ‘royal jelly’.
This feeding process goes on continuously.
About once a minute a worker arrives to feed
the larva. For the first two days the larva is fed
royal jelly and the following four days it is fed
‘bee bread’ – a mixture of flower pollen and
honey. Over this period the larva grows so
quickly, it fills the entire cell.
Sequenced
It now begins to produce a sticky silk from explanation
glands near its mouth. Weaving back and (incubation
forth, it spins the silk into a lacy cocoon. At this and pupa)
stage the workers stop feeding the larva and
seal the cell with wax. Inside the cocoon, the
soft, legless body of the grub stiffens. Outlines
of legs, wings, eyes, antennae, begin to form.
The larva is changing into a pupa.
Sequenced
Twelve days later, a sharp new pair of jaws explanation
begins to cut away at the wax sealing the cell. (emergence
The cell opens and the new worker bee from
appears. After about one day, this new bee is cocoon)
busy at work in the organisation of the hive.