I was taught that the fat (overweight, larger) number has a belly that sticks out into the space of the skinny number.
The trouble is that any system that doesn’t rely on inherent symbolic meaning can be misremembered - for example “Little on the Left equals Larger than”. I could imagine someone even getting the alligator thing wrong, somehow.
I’ve experienced the same problem myself trying to remember which of exactly two possibilities is the right one - for example, which of two lanes on a particular road later splits to form the middle lane.
Another one I had trouble with was Port and Starboard - Someone suggested I remember it by the comparative word lengths (Port, Left are both short words - Right, Starboard are both longer words) - but I found myself doubting the system and wondering if the notable thing was based on opposites.
(I now manage to remember it by reciting the phrase “I have a little RED PORT LEFT in my glass”)
But in the case of < and > their meaning is visually represented in the symbols themselves.
My teacher grew an alligator with big teeth that always tried to eats the bigger number. Or you can remember that the wide end is bigger than the narrow (pointy) end. The number by the wide end is always bigger. Now go to school and yell at your teacher for not teaching you these ubiquitous mnemonics.
Read it from left to right and at the left side of the symbol, there is either a lesser or greater opening.
I’m not sure a classroom is the proper habitat for a large reptile. Did he keep it in a terrarium? Though you’ve got to admire the dedication, the only thing a teacher ever grew in a class I attended was peppercress in an eggshell.
I think this would be confusing for most people because the narrow end is pointy. The wide end not looking pointy, it would be hard to remember that it “points” to anything.
That’s what I always thought. I don’t know where all this alligator talk is coming from. 
Actually, I wonder if any teachers used Pac-Man to explain this.
One of my teachers did, actually. But it was part of his thing on the mouth of anything after using example of the hungry fish and we were all Luke “no its an alligator, not a fish.”
I did, sort of. I was taught that it was a hungry fish trying to eat the bigger number. But the teacher drew the fish surrounding the smaller number, which made it look like the fish had already swallowed the smaller number. I was totally confused by that for about two years until finally my brother explained that the big end goes next to the big number.
The modern symbols for greater than and less than were invented in 1631 by Thomas Harriot, ten years after he died. He was one smart zombie, and a pretty interesting fellow even before he died.
I heard about the alligator thing here, but I was taught < looks like an L, as in “Less than”. So when I’m reading the equation my mind immediately sees “3 <ess than 4”.
Of course that may not work in all languages and really only works if you’re consistent about using “greater than” for > as opposed to “Larger than”.
tennis was to blame for the animal thing.
Exactly. Either way, “<” means you’re going from smaller to larger; “>” means you’re going from larger to smaller.
The alligator image seems needlessly complex. I learned the concept that the smaller end points to the smaller number. Simple, easy to remember. Fits the OP’s requirements to a T.
What difference?
In both cases, the big end is the greater thing (either value or volume).
Alligator head!
The alligator is bad enough (“big end next to big number” was always good enough for me), but I once had a teacher try to explain it in terms of trail blazes: If you follow a trail in the direction of the arrowhead, then the mile markers on the trail get smaller and smaller. As if a bunch of second-graders had any idea how trails were blazed.
While the “smaller end points to the smaller number” is a reasonable way to remember it, I would hardly call the alligator image “complex.” :dubious: But then again, I grew up in the Pac-Man era and it was a pretty easy step from > to mouth and, yes, I was taught the Pac-Man method as a way to remember it, too.
The alligator image may work better for some people because there’s a little more to it than just “smaller end” of the symbol. The whole point is to come up with a memorable association. The alligator image is a very vivid, memorable mini-story that is easy to recall, whereas “smaller end points to smaller number” may be too simple and forgettable for some people, even though there is a visual element to it. Personally, I can usually remember things fairly well without mnemonics, but as a teacher I’ve found that some people really rely on them and for these folks the more detailed and interesting associations often work better than simpler versions.
And the thing about these memory aids is that what works for one person may not work at all for someone else. It’s not a one-size-fits-all kind of solution.
I always remember it with the bird analogy. It’s a bird’s beak and he’s of course looking at the bigger seed or whatever, and so…
dammit.
And I think of Pac Man. Or I think like in music, with the crescendo and diminuendo or decrescendo sign, where the “small” quiet end is the point, and the loud “big” end is where they split apart and get bigger.
Never mind the alligators, and big numbers eating small numbers and whatever. There are only two symbols, right? So, all you have to do is remember* one* of them. And the other will be self explanatory. KISS
But is it simpler to think of them as two separate symbols, or as one symbol that could be pointing in two different directions?