Teaching Analogies to Kids in Elementary School
Analogies can be a tricky concept for a lot of kids. It takes some time and practice to really understand how they work. But you can help! Here are a few tips on how to teach your students about analogies.
Tips for teaching analogies
Tip One: Use Concrete Items
Children will understand analogies more easily if you use concrete, everyday items as examples. Here are a few examples:
A page is to a book as a brick is to a wall.
A ring is to a finger as a watch is to a wrist.
A shoe is to a foot as a mitten is to a hand.
Tip Two: Focus on Relationships
The key part of an analogy is the relationship involved. It is important to look at the relationship of the first pair of items, not the category. Without this understanding, kids often choose something that goes with the first two items.
For example, let’s look at the analogy: “A shoe is to a foot as a mitten is to a _________.” Students should focus on the relationship (a shoe goes on a foot) to know that the mitten must go on the answer. Otherwise, kids may be distracted by choices such as boot, sandal, or something else that goes with feet. :)
Tip Three: Make a Sentence
This last tip has worked really well with my kids! Have them make a sentence with the first pair in the analogy, then make sure the second pair work in the sentence. If we look at the same example, students might make the sentence: “You wear a shoe on your foot.” So the other pair must fit as well: “You wear a mitten on your _____.” This helps kids avoid the issue above about picking shoe-related words. :)
Conclusion
Don’t get discouraged if your students have trouble learning analogies at first. That is totally normal! Keep working with them and give them tons of examples - you are sure to see the concept click!
Resources Available
Looking for some practice worksheets? Take a look at our picture analogies for grades PreK through 2nd grade: