How to Write a Compare and Contrast Essay | Advance Writing

hi everyone we're going to talk about compare contrast writing in this video and i'm going to give you some tips on how to get ideas how to organize those ideas and how to connect those ideas for writing about comparisons or contrasts or both it's a mode that we use all the time when we're speaking when we want to convince people of things and we also use it in academic writing all the time you may or may not be aware but you're probably already using it so let's just make sure that you're doing it in a way that can help you convince people that you're right even if you're not because isn't that what writing's all about sometimes is we're convincing people using really strong arguments to argue our opinion compare means look at similarities contrast means look at differences now you can look at only similarities you can write a comparison paper where you just focus on similarities in your paper or you can just focus on contrasting looking at differences or you can do both it's up to you most of the time it's up to you but you really want to make sure you know what you're going to write about and what you want to say i always like to talk about things that i'm familiar with so i'm going to talk about running and swimming okay so let's just look at those two sports my whole reason why i want to compare the two or contrast them is because i want to convince people that i think even though i love swimming i want to convince people that running's a better option i can't just say running's better they're going to be like why why is it better what what what and then i have to have a reason and if i haven't thought about it i'm not gonna have a reason if i've thought about it i would have come up with some ways to compare the two or contrast the two in ways that shows that running is advantageous so let's talk about how to do that i always recommend using a venn diagram you put the two things you're going to be writing about and they need to have some sort of similarity okay from the beginning running and swimming are both sports okay so it makes sense that we can compare them if i put running and markers that wouldn't really make a lot of sense so make sure from the beginning you're writing about things that already already have a point of comparison that are already somehow within the same realm okay all right then you draw two circles around it in the middle this is where there are similarities here's where there's differences so now you have to think okay i thought for a while i came up with some things that i think are different about them running is social you can run and talk with people but you can get lots of injuries from running it's easy to access you just have to find a place to run and maybe have shoes but a lot of people run without shoes so you don't really even need to access expensive shoes and stress relief that's what i thought of over here for swimming i pointed out that it's more solitary even if you do it with a team you got your head in the water the whole time you're not really talking to anyone it's harder to access because you have to find water where do you find water pools or oceans or rivers or lakes but that's hard that's not easy to find some tanks equipment you need a lot of equipment you need to have expensive suit you need to have expensive goggles and cap and all these different things but a great thing about it is that you don't really get injured with swimming because you're in water um and it's stressful i mean i put that i think it's stressful just because when i'm swimming since i'm not talking to people i'm thinking about a million things and i'm not focusing on swimming uh i'm i'm just thinking thinking thinking so it's stressful for me all right now what about similarities okay so i kind of got some ideas for similarities but not a lot maybe i can think of more maybe i won't maybe i just can say more about the differences i only came up with that they both have health benefits and that they both allow the people to make friends um because even with swimming you can make friends if you're on a team okay so at this point now i say okay i still want to point out that i think running's a better is a better option um so how am i going to do that i have a lot more to say about the differences between these sports so i'm going to focus on the differences i'm not even going to look at the similarities let's take that out um but because i'm gonna write a five paragraph essay three is a good number three body paragraphs in the body of that five paragraph essay that's a great place three so you wanna find three things that you can talk about and i say look for three points of comparison even if you're not comparing but you need three points of comparison so let's look at these again and see if we can find a connection so running is social swimming is solitary there we go that is a similarity there i mean it's a difference they're different but we're talking about the same point which is whether you do it with people or you do it alone so i'm gonna call i'm gonna point this this one out over here and i'm gonna say that it's um so i point out between these two i'm just gonna call it social right now i can think about what i wanna call it later injuries oh no injuries okay so i'm gonna call that one the physical i don't know what yet physical something um but i got it okay uh easy to access hard to access okay so this one i can call access okay over here stress relief stressful okay so i could focus i can make a fourth point okay stress so let's take a look at the points of comparison that i pulled out from my brainstorm i have social physical access and stress i really want to focus on just three of those so what i'm gonna do is i think i can say more about these three than this i'm just going to focus on these three for my paper so to be honest i've been thinking about this a little bit and i actually changed my mind i'm not going to focus on the physical i'm going to focus on equipment i think i can say a lot about that and i'm going to add it to this point as well you'll see my paper okay so i pulled out those three points of comparison that i want to focus on for building my argument in this paper and those are social access equipment i'm going to say a lot more about them later i don't need to figure out exactly how to write them right now i'm just trying to get the ideas clear in my head okay and a point you should know is that you can organize these however you want in your paper i always suggest to that the writer choose which one uh they think is the most impactful most important and put it last because i always like to say save the best for last because that's the last point the reader's gonna read and that's the last chance you get to convince them okay so there's two ways that you can organize your compare contrast paper if you're writing a compare contrast paper where the whole thing is a compare contrast paper then there is a specific structure i'm going to point out but i do want to say that you could write a paper where you just include one paragraph or even one sentence that uses compare contrast kind of structure what i'm going to show you in this video though is just the two main patterns that we use for this type of mode okay so the first one and my favorite is point by point it's called point by point so that just means you are going to go in the body of your paper you're going to go point by point okay so let me just back up first of course you want to have your intro paragraph in your essay and at the end you want to have your conclusion uh paragraph okay and if you need to review those things i do have videos on those but i'm focusing on the body right here the pattern that we're going to use in the body okay so inside the body of an essay you can have as many paragraphs as you want i'm just going to focus on the three body paragraphs for a five paragraph essay now inside of one so you would have it would be like this three body paragraphs now let's focus in on what one of those would look like so what i'm going to do in the first one is i'm going to focus on the first point okay and it could be any of these but let's say it's social the social benefits okay so we'll want to focus on the social benefits the second body paragraph i'm going to focus on access okay and then the third one i want to focus on the equipment what are you going to do inside the body of each of those paragraphs well what you're going to do is you're going to compare or you're going to contrast what are you going to compare contrast well you're going to compare or contrast the two things you're writing about in this case i'm writing about swimming and running so in the first body paragraph i'm going to focus on the social benefits of swimming and the social benefits of running i'm going to compare them or i'm going to contrast them you'll see in my paper what i do it's up to you what you want to do access what am i going to be talking about in that paragraph i'm going to be comparing or contrasting swimming and running but i'm going to focus on access to the sport and then finally equipment i'm going to focus on swimming and running only and comparing or contrasting the type of equipment needed for those sports okay so that's how you do point by point okay that's just an outline so the other type is the block method so again you want to have intro paragraph you want to have a conclusion paragraph but in the middle you're going to have the body and in the body of a compare contrast paper you're going to have blocks like this it's really two main blocks the first block is focusing on the first thing you're talking about which is swimming okay and the second block is talking about running so you're only talking about swimming in this paragraph and you're only talking about running in this paragraph but don't forget you've got to focus on those points of comparison in this one and in this one you got to make sure you discuss the same things otherwise you're not really comparing or contrasting so in here you're going to focus on the social the access in this one you're going to focus on social access and equipment and in this one you're going to focus on social access and equipment so really you only have two body paragraphs but that's not true i think it's a good idea to add a third body paragraph sort of where you give a recommendation you could add another paragraph where you give some sort of like evaluation or recommendation of which one you would recommend and then your conclusion okay so let's see this in action on an essay okay everyone here we are now looking at the sample paper i'm gonna just go down here scroll down you can find this um below there's a point by point pattern here and then the block method which i just wrote on the board okay so you can see both of those patterns there this is only for the body of the paper and then i have a sample paper right here it's a simple basic five paragraph essay first person is used as support there's no like outside sources or research being done you know to bring in any other support or analysis uh but i think this is a great intro to compare contrast writing so you can see the pattern okay now in this one where i'll just tell you i'm using the point by point pattern okay and the focus really is on contrasting these two things that i'm gonna write about okay so here it is it's called the miles changed me i used to think swimming was the best way to get exercise but after the closure of the local pool in my hometown i was introduced to running miles and miles later i find i found myself trying to convince people to run with me the dollars that i saved in buying less expensive equipment the ease of accessing running trails and the great deal of social connections i made with people i ran with have all changed my mind running is indeed a better option for working out than swimming now obviously this is a person's opinion this is not a fact okay and that is great you want to develop your argument and convince people to believe you right okay so here i'm just gonna highlight the thesis okay um don't forget there's a hook so it's kind of like a little anecdote and then a little transition here and then the thesis the thesis is runnings a better option than swimming okay here we go here's the body due to the many challenges that people face in finding the time and motivation to put towards exercising ease of access is an important factor in choosing a workout and because running is so much easier to do than swimming it is a better option i'm going to highlight this and make it yellow as well because that is the topic sentence of this paragraph it's basically saying that running is easier to access than swimming so it's a better option firstly to swim people have to find water within which to swim finding water can be easy to do if people have access to a pool or a lake nearby but for most people this is not the case meanwhile i'm going to highlight this word because this is one of those compare contrast words that you want to use when you're comparing and contrasting this word shows contrast meanwhile so i was talking about swimming now i'm going to talk about running so swimming is hard to access meanwhile to get a running workout in people simply have to find a place to run a lot of the time this might just mean taking a step outside of one's house and starting and although there are places that are not ideal for running like busy city streets most outdoor surfaces such as sidewalks trails or open fields work quite well for a good run additionally running is easier to access because it doesn't involve any shock factor to start it to be specific swimming requires the participants to go from being outside to submerging their bodies into water the immediate shock of jumping into the water which is usually cold initially is very unpleasant believe me whereas with running the only real shock involved is going from standing to running for these reasons people are more motivated to run than go swimming all right now those probably aren't the most convincing reasons but it works i mean it follows the pattern i'm saying swimming is harder to access than running therefore running is better okay and the first point i'm making is that running is easier to access because you just have to step outside whereas swimming you have to find water so that's the first point okay um and then over here i say additionally okay it's easier because there's no shock factor so i have two points okay the first one is here i'm going to make it blue and the second one is here i'm going to make it blue i want to point out that inside the body of your paragraph right you want to yes you're focusing on you're focusing on the the the point of comparison which is access and you're going to talk about swimming and you're going to talk about running but within that you're talking about access to swimming access to running and then you're talking about the shock of entering a pool and the shock of starting to run from standing so i want you to see the pattern here where i'm doing where it's okay i'm gonna highlight it to make it more clear swimming is pink okay and then uh running is uh red okay uh running is red okay and swimming is pink i i just want you to see the colors because i want you to see that that you're talking about swimming and you're talking about running but you're focusing on that point which is accessing it over here we're talking about swimming and we're talking about running but we're focusing on the shock factor okay and when we transition to swimming running or running swimming we're using a contrast word okay um most of the time it's not always there okay in this case here is that transition word whereas where first i'm talking about swimming and then i'm talking about running so you can see in this paragraph i got my topic sentence which is focusing only on accessing and then i talk about water access for swimming running trail access for running okay and i'm contrasting and then second point is i'm talking about shock factor swimming shock factor running which is about access also and then at the end i give like a little kind of wrap up like a little conclusion for these reasons people are more motivated to run than go swimming all right next point similar to ease so here i'm actually connecting these two paragraphs with this transition word i'm saying similar so i'm going to use this as a as one of those transition words i'm trying to connect and compare similar to ease of access to a workout the amount of equipment that people are required to have in order to participate in running or swimming can affect their motivation to participate in one activity over the other so here i'm gonna highlight that in yellow because that is um the point that's the topic sentence now we're gonna focus on um the equipment that you need for these sports and how uh and i'm gonna argue here that because the running equipment is cheaper and just easier to get and there's less of it it's better okay um even though i don't really believe i actually really love swimming i'm just trying to give you an example alright so here's my first point in that paragraph swimming requires a bathing suit a cap goggles and a towel and flip-flops to wear after getting out of the water okay here's my first point so with my first point i'm making it my point is is going to be blue right competitive swimsuits are necessary for doing swim workouts because they do sorry competitive swimsuits are necessary for doing swim workouts because they do not create drag in the water or come off the swimmer's body when diving in these suits are very expensive starting at a hundred dollars and because of the chlorine in pools these suits deteriorate very quickly requiring the swimmer to spend a great deal of money on them here's my all the details and the support what i want to say about swimsuits okay and that equipment goggles are also very pricey because they're quite technical okay so this whole thing this is all support for the gear the equipment needed for swimming in contrast here i'm going to make that green that's that transition word i'm contrasting you're running running can be done with minimal equipment although a good pair of running shoes may be the most important piece of equipment for a runner there are many runners that do not even wear them due in part to the barefoot running trend if a person does choose to use running shoes expensive ones do not have to be used other than that a sports bra a shirt and some shorts are the only other pieces of clothing one needs and these pieces could be used for years and years without deterioration so you can see this paragraph is a little bit different um i just really kind of focused on the gear and i just talked about swimming first okay so i'm gonna make swimming uh right i'm gonna make swimming pink and then over here i contrasted and i just focused on running okay gear gear that's what i'm talking about last body paragraph finally and i put this one last because i think it's the most impactful it's the most important reason the social benefits of running outweigh those of swimming benefits now i didn't really transition i could i could do that better there most importantly that sounds better most importantly the social benefits of running outweigh those of the swimming benefits there's my topic sentence going to make it yellow first of all even though a swim workout can be done around others on a team the only chance that the swimmers have to talk to one another is when they're on the wall waiting for the coach to call out ready go there's also a chance for swimmers to talk before and after the workout but most people are busy and have to rush to the next activity on the other hand making that green that's our transition on the other hand running doesn't require the participants to put their heads in water so they can actually talk second because runners especially endurance runners trained by themselves at a steady space for miles and miles they can hold a conversation comfortably for a long period of time as a result of talking to someone else uninterrupted for such a long time running partners tend to find that they have common interests for example i met a new running buddy only a few months ago but because i got to spend so much time talking to her i found out that we both like cooking so now we share recipes with each other weekly without the chance to talk like we do while running we wouldn't have been able to become such good friend okay so here i got the first point which is just that focusing on swimming swim workouts swim workouts are uh swim work swim workouts you can't talk on the other hand running make that red you can you can knock okay um and then giving support support support and as you can see in this one i'm actually giving a specific um personal first person experience example to change it up and make it more um specific okay conclusion in the end these two forms of exercise are advantageous in so many ways but if there's going to be a clear winner running wins the gold medal if it offers more social benefits it's easier to access and requires much more affordable equipment the next time you want to convince yourself to get in a workout please remember these points okay and finally at the end you have these transition words if you just wanted to see a few of them just to have more options when you want to compare two things here's a list of them if you want to contrast here's another list it's on this handout all right happy writing

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Id: 02VH8GvMYoc

Length: 24min 54sec (1494 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 24 2021