Comparing: similarity and difference
History · GCSE · The School
Two summaries are not a comparison
Writing a paragraph about A and then a paragraph about B leaves the comparing to the reader. A comparison answer chooses specific POINTS — aims, methods, results, who supported them — and moves through them one at a time, saying for each whether A and B matched or differed. The structure itself has to do the comparing.
Similarity is not automatically weaker
Pupils often assume examiners want difference, and undersell genuine similarities. A shared aim pursued by different methods is a real, gradeable similarity. Noticing it, rather than only cataloguing contrasts, shows a fuller grasp of both subjects. A similarity can even sit alongside a difference in the same paragraph. Two campaigns can converge on the same eventual outcome while their methods stayed opposed throughout. Saying so is stronger than treating the pair as either simply alike or simply opposed.
Naming it directly
A vague link, such as "both wanted change", earns little. A precise one earns far more: both sought an end to racial segregation, though they disagreed sharply about whether violence was ever justified to achieve it. State the point of comparison. Then state the shared or opposing position, in one sentence. Decide which points you are comparing before you start writing. That choice gives the answer a fixed shape, rather than letting it drift from one loosely related fact to the next.
Martin Luther King and Malcolm X both campaigned against racial segregation in the United States and both drew large followings — that is a real similarity, not a minor one. They differed sharply on method: King committed to non-violent civil disobedience, aiming to win over public opinion; Malcolm X argued for self-defence and, for much of his career, rejected integration with a system he judged unwilling to reform. Aim: shared. Method: opposed. Naming both, rather than picking one man to describe, is what a comparison question asks for.
Judging the difference
Do not stop at naming a difference — say how much it mattered. Two approaches can differ in method while converging in the end, since both movements influenced the same later legislation, or differ in a way that produced genuinely different outcomes. A judgement on HOW significant the difference was is what separates a strong comparison from a list of contrasts.
A comparison paragraph, built
Name the point of comparison. State both positions in one sentence, with a fact for each. Say whether this counts as similarity or difference, and how strong it is. Repeat for the next point. A short paragraph built this way, on three points, outscores a page of two separate biographies.