- Gwinnett County School District
- Quality-Plus Teaching Strategies
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Comparison and Contrast
Quality-Plus Teaching Strategies
Frequent Use Strategy
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Comparison and Contrast engages students in delineating, differentiating, and distinguishing information. The four connected strategies for Comparison and Contrast are comparing, classifying, creating analogies, and creating metaphors.
When using Comparison and Contrast, the teacher will model how to analyze, qualify, and organize subtle and significant similarities or differences.
Students will identify similarities and/or differences between two or more items in order to understand how they are alike, equal, or analogous to each other.
Comparison and Contrast is not effective for comparing unlike, irrelevant, and dissimilar ideas or concepts. It is not about the artifacts alone, such as a Venn diagram or T chart. This strategy is especially effective when the learning requires analysis to examine subtle similarities and differences between relevant ideas or concepts and results in a deeper understanding of the people, places, things, or ideas being studied.
References
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Texts
- Silver, H.F. (2010). Compare and contrast: Teaching comparative thinking to strengthen student learning. Alexandria, VA: ASCD. Ch 1 excerpt
- Marzano, R.J. (2017). The new art and science of teaching: More than fifty new instructional strategies for student success. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press. p. 39-41
- Knight, J. (2013). High-impact instruction. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin. p. 96-116 Thinking Maps
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Marzano, R.J. (2017). The new art and science of teaching: More than fifty new instructional strategies for student success. Bloomington, IN: Solution Tree Press. p. 39-40
Look Fors
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The Teacher will…
- model comparative thinking with students demonstrating how to make clear connections by identifying similarities and differences that lead to deeper understanding of the AKS.
- engage students in activities that require comparison, classification, creating analogies, and/or creating metaphors.
The Students will…- compare and classify information.
- identify similarities and differences.
- create analogies and metaphors to develop comparative thinking.
Model Lessons
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Shapes: Agreement Circles
Students will analyze and compare 2D and 3D shapes using informal language to describe similarities and differences.
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Qualitative Graphs: Heart Rate Monitoring
Students will describe the relationship between two quantities and sketch a graph that shows features of a function that has been described verbally.
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Measurement: Concept Cartoons
Students will view concept cartoons and decide which character in the cartoon they most agree with.
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Physical and Chemical Changes
Students will annotate an article, identifying what they think are chemical and physical changes; collaboratively discuss visuals related to chemical and physical changes to determine which does not belong and why then transfer their clarified thinking to a written response.
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For any questions with this guide or its content, please call Instructional Support at (678) 301-6804.