Comparison and/or Contrast Thought and Essay Writing

Here we go! Successful comparison-contrast requires two subjects and a set of points used to examine these subjects.

Example: Pretend we have been studying hippos and rhinos in Africa. Our editor asks us to write a short comparison and/or contrast article about these two animals. First, we make a list of shared points we will use to study these animals.

Our list of points: physical appearance, habitat, predators, eating habits, young-raising, mating habits.

We study both animals in terms of these shared points. Our findings:

Subject A: Hippos	Points	Subject B: Rhinos
Similarity	physical appearance	Similarity
Difference	habitat	Difference
Difference	predators	Difference
Similarity	eating habits	Similarity
Similarity	young-raising	Similarity
Difference	mating habits	Difference

Now we narrow by picking one of the following:

(NOTE: The thesis paragraph and the conclusion are the same in all organizational pattern choices.)

A Contrast Paper Outline:

Narrow to two differences:

Let’s pick habitat and predators as our two differences.

Paragraph #1 Thesis Paragraph—introduction plus thesis sentence

Ø Thesis Sentence shell: Subject A and Subject B differ in Point Of Difference #1 and Point of Difference #2.

Ø Filled in thesis sentence: Hippos (Subject A) and rhinos (Subject B) differ in habitat (Point Of Difference #1) and predators (Point of Difference #2).

Paragraph #2: Hippos—habitat (Subject A—Point 1 difference)

Paragraph #3: Rhinos—habitat (Subject B—Point 1 difference)

Paragraph #4: Hippos—predators (Subject A—Point 2 difference)

Paragraph #5: Rhinos—predators (Subject B—Point 2 difference)

Paragraph—Conclusion

A Comparison Paper Outline:

Narrow to three similarities:

Let’s pick physical appearance, eating habits, and young-raising as our three similarities.

Paragraph #1 Thesis Paragraph—introduction plus thesis sentence

Ø Thesis Sentence shell: Subject A and Subject B are similar in Point Of Similarity #1, Point Of Similarity #2, and Point Of Similarity #3.

Ø Filled in thesis sentence: Hippos (Subject A) and rhinos (Subject B) are similar in physical appearance (Point Of Similarity #1), eating habits (Point Of Similarity #2), and young-raising (Point Of Similarity #3).

Paragraph #2: Hippos and Rhinos—phys. Appear. (Subject A and B—Pt. 1 similarity)

Paragraph #3: Hippos and Rhinos—eating habits (Subject A and B—Pt. 2 similarity)

Paragraph #4: Hippos and Rhinos—young-raising (Subjects A and B—Pt. 3 similarity)

Paragraph—Conclusion

A Comparison-Contrast Paper Outline: (Begin with the similarities unless you have a good reason not to.)

Narrow to one or two differences and one or two similarities

Let’s pick two similarities—physical appearance and eating habits; and one difference—habitat as our mix of similarities and differences.

Paragraph #1 Thesis Paragraph—introduction plus thesis sentence

Ø Thesis Sentence shell: Subject A and Subject B are similar in Point of Similarity #1 and Point of Similarity #2, but differ in and Point of Difference #1.

Ø Filled in thesis sentence: Hippos (Subject A) and rhinos (Subject B) are similar in physical appearance (Point Of Similarity #1) and eating habits (Point Of Similarity #2), but differ in habitat (Point Of Difference #1).

Paragraph #2: Hippos and Rhinos—physical appearance (Subject A and B—Point 1)

Paragraph #3: Hippos and Rhinos—eating habits (Subject A and B—Point 2)

Paragraph #4: Hippos—habitat (Subject A—Point 1)

Paragraph #5: Rhinos—habitat (Subject B—Point 1)

Paragraph—Conclusion