A Cookbook Approach
To take the cookbook analogy a step further and clarify our approach, consider each of the following three cookbooks.
Recipes and Remembrances
Compiled at the First United Methodist Church of Baldwin City, Kansas
This cookbook is very straightforward and prescriptive: the ingredients, procedures, and expected outcome for each dish are well defined. Though someone using this cookbook could prepare the specific dishes in the book, they wouldn't learn any alternative preparations or information about the ingredients. This is not the type of cookbook that the EET is modeled after...
On Food and Cooking
By Harold McGee
This book describes the source and biochemistry of food ingredients and how they change through cooking. Users learn loads of interesting stuff about food, but receive no straightforward instructions on using this information in specific recipes. This is not the type of cookbook the EET is modeled after either...
The Joy of Cooking
By Irma S. Rombauer, Marion Rombauer Becker, and Ethan Becker
This cookbook offers specific recipes, but it also provides opportunities to learn about ingredients and cooking techniques along the way. The book's "About" sections offer valuable advice on choosing and using ingredients, and recipes have suggestions for customizing dishes or making alternate presentations. This is the type of cookbook the Earth Exploration Toolbook is modeled after.
Summary
So, though we present these activities in a cookbook manner, our ultimate goal is to build user's skills so they can use data to conduct their own explorations and investigations of the Earth system. As you work through any chapter in the EET, consider other aspects of the tool or dataset that you might explore or questions that you could answer by consulting the data. After you're familiar with making one type of data product with a tool, move on to analyze other datasets, or explore the same data with another tool. You'll be a competent cook in the data kitchen in short order!
