How-To Examples: Description and Analysis Notes

Dog Obedience Training

• multiple pages, image and text, text chunked in topics (rather than steps) across pages, but bottom nav (next / prev) suggests linear order
• no links in the text itself. links go to other areas of the site.
• dominantly second person text, with some slips into 3rd (one). Second person is casting reader (you) as a novice trainer of your pet, with advice coming from (I) expert trainer of other people's dogs, not just pet.
• some text is Trainer jargon and authorative teacher-lecture
  • ("leash based obedience training system"
  • By learning to train a dog with the leash, one should in the process, eventually acquire the skills necessary to train a dog with whatever tools are at hand.
  • It's my belief that reward training predates leash training.
• one page (reward training) amplifies the advice by going into "the historic significance of reward styles of training". Not sure what to make of this. It emphasizes the teacher-writer over the advice itself, and runs counter to Neilsen and the short-and-simple postion.
• paras 3 - 4 sentences. topic sentence seems present in many but less so in the Reward Training page
• overall organization and development of the text - by page - to review
• supplementary material at top of page in bullet list
• images of dog and trainer for decoration more than illustration of the text.

• single page, with grey-scale diagrams and b&w illustrations of the procedure
• labled a Fact Sheet from OSU Ag Extension
• two parts: intro addresses why to shock a well and how wells become contaminated. body presents the procedure.
• table used to present amount of bleach to use in shocking the well (which is step 1)
• mix of simple and compound sentences, dominantly simple, declarative sentences.
• paras are 2 - 3 sentences
• some passive (Shock Chlorination of Wells and Springs rather than Chlorinating a Well or Shocking a Well...)
• procedure set off with heading.
• procedure steps for shocking the well are numbered.
• procedure for shocking a spring is in one para (subordinated)
• warnings at end of page are not set off with a heading
• layout: text and images all set flush left
• no links
• no highlighting or bolding for scanning (page isn't meant to be scanned, perhaps).
• page is designed to print

• I find the prose style of the intro tricky to describe. The topics, vocab and sentence construction suggest the prose is cast for an educated reader: it's semi-formal, textbook/lecture prose (that's an impression and evaluation, not a description). The intro might be taken too jargony, but the terms ("well casing" "water system") are common. Technical terms are used when necessary to understand the amount of chlorine. The topics suggest that the page is not written for professional plumbers, who would know most of this. The page might frustrate a reader in a hurry, who wants only the procedure.
• that is, the page isn't as concise as it could be. A concise page might cut the intro material to leave just the procedure, or move it to a subordinate position, or to a different page.
• Reader role: the page casts the reader as a well-educated homeowner concerned about the well (It starts with "What should I do if my water is contaminated with bacteria?") and interested in some background understanding of wells and springs in general (the intro material), as well as skilled enough to read a table and follow a short procedure. The prose style is that of extension officer giving background info as well as procedure.