Generic Structure Explanation Text & Explanation Text Example – The word explanation in English, of course, is already familiar. In the world of education, or even in our daily lives, we often encounter explanations, or explanations in Indonesian. Explanation text is a text that explains the occurrence of a process.
Every day in class, the teacher will explain something to his students. Starting from the process of the occurrence of rain, how the organs of the human body work, how to operate a machine and others. The explanation is the same as the explanation text.
Explanation text or explanatory text has the aim of explaining various social, natural and cultural phenomena. To understand what an explanation text is, what is the generic structure, how to write an explanation text, and practice questions and answers, see the text below.
Pengertian Explanation Text
Explanation text in English is a text that explains the occurrence of a process.
This type of text is actually a bit similar to procedure text. Procedure text has the goal of explaining how to do something, while explanation text explains how a process is.
Explanation text tells how the process starts from the formation of natural, social, scientific to cultural phenomena. Texts of this type are very often found in books on science, history and geography.
This book provides an understanding of the types of text for those of you who are in high school. In addition, this book is equipped with the purpose and function of the text, structure and linguistic elements in it. The book is packaged in light and simple language. So that understanding of several types of reading texts that are often raised as exam material will be easier to understand.
Generic Structure Explanation Text
Like other types of text, explanation text has the following structure:
1. Title
Every text or writing must have a title at the beginning to tell what the contents are written in a writing, as well as explanation text.
When giving a title for an explanation text, we don’t need to beat around the bush, just write down what fits the contents of the text. For example, ‘What causes a flood?’, ‘Why is the earth rotating?’ or ‘How the lungs work’ and so on.
The title in an explanation text has the goal of preparing or directing the reader to the text. The title in this text usually appears in various forms that mention an action to the questions ‘How’ and ‘Why’. Such questions will be answered with explanations in the text.
2. Opening Statement
Explanation text has a writing purpose which of course must provide valid and factual information to readers. That way, a very strong opening statement needs to be inserted in the writing.
It would be better if the author includes evidence of previous research such as journals or articles that have already been verified.
In the opening statement, the writer can also identify a process to be explained in the text. To write an opening statement, you can try to focus on the process of a phenomenon you want to explain.
With an opening statement that introduces or identifies a phenomenon you wish to discuss, it will give the reader a brief introduction to it and provide a brief understanding of the type of text you are writing.
3. Sequencing
When writing an article, you should separate it into several sequences or parts. Of course, you don’t want to make your readers dizzy reading one very long paragraph.
Connect the paragraph with the cause-and-effect relationship of the phenomenon being written. The paragraphs written must be logically ordered and explain why or how something happened.
The sequential explanation must contain a series of events, actions, causes or processes of the phenomenon. Events that occur are also written down in order of time or cause.
All of this must be written down in detail and accurately. Usually the written sequence of events will expand by explaining how events occurred in the time period.
4. Conclusion
Conclusions or conclusions are written when all explanations have been written. The conclusion given at the end of the explanation text will give the impression that the writing made is valid.
5. Visual
In explanation text, visuals or diagrams have become commonplace to embed. The images or visuals provided are useful for clarifying existing explanation texts. Moreover, in scientific texts, accurate diagrams or illustrations are very important to support explanation texts.
Those of you who are looking to deepen your English at the high school level can get an explanation of explanations about the types of texts through the English Student Book for Class 12. All explanations are thoroughly reviewed along with questions and answers.
Language Feature Explanation Text
Explanation text has language features, namely:
- Using the present tense, because an explanation text discusses a fact.
- Using complex noun groups, it aims to build detailed descriptions for example, ‘Threatening’, ‘Rampaging’ or ‘Enormous’ and many more.
- Using abstract nouns such as ‘heat’, ‘earthquakes’, ‘floods’, etc.
- Using a sentence with a clear subject and using the verb agreement.
- Using action verbs to explain the cause of the phenomenon being discussed, such as ‘from’ or ‘started from’.
- Use adverbial phrases of a time and place to tell when and where this event took place. For example. ‘Its to be found in Sulawesi, Indonesia’.
- Use connectors to link time sequences in causal order. For example ‘after’, ‘finally’, ‘so’, ‘then’ and others.
- Use passive voice which is useful for emphasizing the focus of events that are taking place.
- Using time conjunctions, for example, ‘when’, ‘as’. This time conjunction is used to sequence and connect events so that the written text flows more. This time conjunction can be placed first in a sentence to focus the reader’s attention.
- Use technical terms or word chains about the subject.
Find other English formulas or tenses that can help you improve your English skills in the book Tenses And Exercises: Quick Formulas to Master English.
Types of Explanation Text
when writing an explanation text, of course we already know that the phenomenon we want to explain does exist and then explain why and how this phenomenon can occur. To write explanation text you must have and seek a lot of knowledge before starting to write. There are several types of explanation text.
The first is a text that describes an event or how something works. For example, how a car works, or how a computer works until natural events such as how landslides can occur, how mountains can erupt and so on.
The second type of explanation text is a text that explains why something happened. For example, why can the mirror in the bathroom fog up when we take a hot shower, why are owls more active at night, why do humans close their eyes when they sneeze, and so on.
For the third type is to explain the similarities and differences in objects. This type of text is related to the topic of science and technology where an explanation of a natural or non-natural phenomenon occurs. For example, how can a tornado form, how can sound move, how does a cell phone work, why does a tsunami happen and so on.
Explanation text also contains explanations about human relations with the human environment, for example how cotton can be processed into clothing, why humans have to exercise and consume healthy food, how milk can be processed into yogurt and so on.
How to Write Explanation Text
Writing by utilizing time as effectively as possible is very important. When writing an explanation text, you need to spend about 20 percent of your time researching the topic you want to cover. Apart from that, you also have to make sure that you know what you want to explain.
Take the same time to compose the writing you want to make. You can make mind-mapping or graphics that can help you write the outline of your explanation more easily.
That way, with this 40 percent time, you can already form ideas and structure your writing. The rest, you just have to use the time to edit the spelling or grammar in your writing.
There are several points that must be considered in writing explanation text. First, what is it about? what do you explain, what is a good title and which part is very important? which part needs to be explained, how does it work, moreover what things might be included in the writing and so on.
Assume that the reader is not as knowledgeable about the topic you are writing about as you are. so, at the beginning of writing you should be able to briefly explain the topic before entering the body of writing.
Use an interesting title so that it can encourage readers to read your writing further. In writing explanation text, you also have to use correct scientific terms or technical terms.
Apart from that, you can also create interesting visuals or use appropriate diagrams if possible. It should be remembered again, explanation text is written in the present tense because this text discusses a fact and is written from the third person’s perspective. Improve your English skills through the book 7 Habits of Effective English Learning.
Example Explanation Text
How Do Fish Breathe?
All animals breathe just like humans. How they breathe, however, varies. Breathe by inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide as waste. Air flows in through the human’s nose or mouth into the lungs where oxygen is transported through the blood to the rest of the human body. Humans need air to breathe. So, what does that mean for animals that live in the water?
Like humans, fish also need oxygen and emit carbon dioxide to survive. But using the lungs, these creatures that live in water use organs called gills. The gills are organs located on the sides of the fish’s head. These gills have many small blood vessels called capillaries.
When the fish opens, the water will flow over the gills. After that, the blood in the capillaries will pick up oxygen that is soluble in water. The blood then moves through the fish’s body to provide oxygen throughout the body, just like in humans.
All bony fish also have a bony plate called an operculum. This operculum is useful for opening and closing to protect the gills. Breathing underwater is difficult. The air we breathe has an oxygen concentration of 200,000 parts per million.
Whereas water only has a concentration of 4 to 8 parts per million. This means fish need to flow a lot of water over their gills to get the amount of oxygen to survive. In addition, the gills are very useful for extracting the oxygen needed by fish.
Breathing becomes more difficult as the oxygen concentration decreases. Low levels of oxygen concentration make it impossible for animals to survive. Although it can occur naturally, it can also be created by human activity.
When pollution is high, such as waste dumped into the sea, this will cause algae blooms which then die and decompose. Furthermore, it will cause the zone to have a low oxygen concentration level of oxygen.
Fish need clean water to breathe. Similarly, humans need clean air to breathe. Humans can help these gilled creatures to thrive by keeping their habitat free of pollutants.
How Do Fish Breathe?
All animals breathe like humans. How they breathe, of course, varies greatly. Breathing is a process of inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide as waste. Air flows in through the human nose or mouth to the lungs where oxygen is transported through the blood throughout the human body. Humans need air to breathe. So, what about animals that live in water?
Like humans, fish also need oxygen and emit carbon dioxide to survive. But instead of using the lungs, creatures that live in water use organs called gills. Gills are organs located on the sides of the fish’s head.
These gills have many small blood vessels called capillaries. When the fish opens, water will flow over the gills. After that, the blood in the capillaries will pick up water-soluble oxygen. The blood then moves through the fish’s body to provide oxygen throughout the body, just like it does in humans.
All bony fish also have a bony plate called the operculum. The operculum is useful for opening and closing to protect the gills. Breathing underwater is a difficult thing.
The air we breathe has an oxygen concentration of 200,000 parts per million. whereas water only has a concentration of 4 to 8 parts per million. This means fish need to circulate a lot of water over their gills to get the proper amount of oxygen to survive. In addition, gills are very useful for extracting the oxygen needed by fish.
Breathing becomes more difficult as the oxygen concentration decreases. Low levels of oxygen concentration make it impossible for animals to survive. Although it can occur naturally, it can also be created by human activity.
When pollution is high, such as garbage dumped into the sea, it will cause the development of algae which then die and decompose. Furthermore, it will cause the zone to have a low level of oxygen concentration.
Fish need clean water to breathe. Likewise, humans need clean air to breathe. Humans can help these gill-like creatures thrive by keeping their habitat free of pollutants.
Exercise Question Explanation Text
1. What is the text about?
what is the text about?
2. what is the purpose of the text
above
3. Does fish breathe using an organ called ?
Fish breathe using an organ called?
4. Where are the organs located?
Where is this organ located?
5. What is meant by breathing?
What is meant by breathing?
6. What does concentration mean in Indonesian?
What does ‘concentration’ mean in Indonesian?
7. How do humans breathe?
How do humans breathe?
8. From the text above, we imply that?
From the text it can be implied that?
9. What does the word ‘thrive’ mean?
What is meant by ‘thrive’?
10. What does the third paragraph focus on?
The third paragraph focuses on?
11. What do humans inhale when they breathe?
What do humans inhale when breathing?
12. What is released when humans exhale?
What is released when humans exhale?
13. What does the word ‘decompose’ mean?
Apa arti dari kata ‘decompose’?
14. Based on the text above, do fish need clean water to breathe?
Based on the text above, do fish need clean water to breathe?
15. How can humans help fish to stay alive in their habitat?
How can humans help fish to survive in their habitat?
Answers to Explanation Text Questions
- how fish breathe
- to inform the fish’s respiratory system
- gill
- on the side of the fish head
- inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide
- concentration
- inhale and exhale
- Fish breathe with gills and need clean water
- develop
- The gills are very useful for extracting the oxygen needed by fish.
- oxygen
- carbon dioxide
- rot
- yes
- by keeping their habitat clean