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Gwinnett County Public Schools

Comparison and Contrast

SEL Competencies: Self- Management, Social Awareness, Responsible Decision Making

Frequent Use Strategy

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.

Look Fors

Teacher Behaviors for Promoting SEL Competencies

  • Teach students how to build upon each other’s thoughts.
  • Provide students with the appropriate language and actions for communicating how to agree and disagree. Model how to use the appropriate language and actions.

Student Behaviors for Developing SEL Competencies

  • Recognize, understand, and empathize with others when using comparison, analogies, classification, and metaphors.
  • Build or extend upon peers’ thoughts and ideas.

References

Model Lessons

Shapes: Agreement Circles

Students will analyze and compare 2D and 3D shapes using informal language to describe similarities and differences.

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.

Measurement: Concept Cartoons

Students will view concept cartoons and decide which character in the cartoon they most agree with.

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.