Sentence:  While we had expected that compulsive children in the unstructured school setting would have difficulty when compared to those in the structured , we were surprised to find that the achievement of the high compulsives within the schools where the whole-word method is used in beginning reading <WSD>compares</WSD> favorably with that of the low compulsives . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  examine and note the similarities or differences of