Explanations are written to explain the processes involved in natural and social phenomena or to explain how something works.

An explanation usually consists of the following:

• a general statement to introduce the topic, such as, "A butterfly goes through several stages in its life cycle"; and
• a series of logical steps explaining how or why something occurs. These steps continue until the final state is produced or the explanation is complete. For example, "A goes through this process to become B, B then goes through this process to become C."

They are usually written

• in the simple present tense,
• using temporal (then, next, after) or causal (because, therefore) conjunctions, and
• using mainly action clauses.