May Tournament Notes

Cuba package can be seen here:

http://www.google.com/notebook/public/07321474036661839468/BDSOkDAoQ6ff5k5Qk

May Tournament Notes

Black History For and Against

DodgeBall For and Against

May 16 Champions Tournament

Here is a background packet for the topic: The bottled water industry does more harm than good.

http://www.google.com/notebook/public/07321474036661839468/BDQmeDQoQsNDauZAk


and here is a packet black history should be compulsory for middle schools

http://www.google.com/notebook/public/07321474036661839468/BDQk7SgoQgur4spEk

and here was our packet for Dodgeball should be banned

http://www.google.com/notebook/public/07321474036661839468/BDchU5goQq8_n8PEj

Resources for April 25 Debate

All middle school classes should be grouped by ability


http://www.smallschoolsproject.org/PDFS/def.pdf
http://www.ncmsa.net/heterogr.htm
http://www.dukegiftedletter.com/articles/vol1no2_rb.html


The US should adopt a National ID card system


 http://www.schneier.com/essay-034.html
http://www.idebate.org/debatabase/topic_details.php?topicID=34
http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/upfront/debate/index.asp?article=d1114

Parents should be criminally liable for their children’s school truancy.


http://ojjdp.ncjrs.org/pubs/reform/ch2_d.html
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2004/mar/24/schools.education
http://snipurl.com/gi74a


Honesty is the best policy
http://ezinearticles.com/?Is-Honesty-the-Best-Policy?&id=664900
http://www.renewamerica.us/columns/cobb/090405
http://home.earthlink.net/~rdmadden/webdocs/Is_Honesty_Best.html
http://www.nimzigirls.com/2009/02/19/is-honesty-really-the-best-policy/

Topics for April 25 debate

Parents should be criminally liable for their children’s school truancy. 

The US should adopt a National ID card system. 

All middle school classes should be grouped by ability. 

Honesty is the best policy.

Wed 18 Feb debate topic and issues reference

This week's debate club topic is whether university education should be free.  Here are some articles to use in connection with the discussion on Wednesday. Ricard Creech will be taking the class

 

http://www.abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=6385265&page=1

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2002/nov/20/uk.highereducation

 

Jan 31 Debate Resources

Here are the info packs to help you with the remaining topics for this Saturday

Governors should not be allowed to appoint interim senators.

No Child Left Behind is a failed policy.

Also please note this important development for the Congo topic  (the arrest of the main rebel leader) . Here is a good place to read up on the Congo Topic

Here are some background articles for the Dodge Ball topic

Debate Club returns - Jan topics

For our Debaters who showed so much promise in 2008 we have the topics for the next debate tournament on Jan 31 

They are:

All primary and secondary schools should ban dodge ball.
No Child Left Behind is a failed policy.
Governors should not be allowed to appoint interim senators.
The United States should militarily intervene in Congo.

We will do the dodge ball topic this Wednesday.

 Please prepare some arguments for and against the ban and come with a case line prepared for your argument.

Could Students with a family name beginning with A-K prepare arguments and a case line in support of the ban. Students with family names beginning with L-Z should prepare arguments and a case line against the ban.

Remember the case line simply summarizes how your team will argue the topic: eg Dodge ball kills students and there is no evidence it improves fitness (you then need to be able to back this up with facts!) .

As we prepare keep in mind you need to show WHY your argument is better than your opponent. simply listing your arguments will not win the debate. this is why we do flow charts so bring pen and paper please.

It is nearing exam period so students should try to practice quick research and short notes.

Two topics for Wednesday

We have a tournament this Saturday so this Wednesday we are planning an extended class ending 4:30 to cover the final two topics. We will confirm this as soon as we have Westland's confirmation.

The topics we will cover are:

The United States should stop funding the international space station. 

and

The United States should adopt the 35 hour workweek. 

The packets to help prepare for these topics are at the Chatterbox site . Even if u can't make it this Saturday pls make some notes of the pro and con arguments so u can participate in Wednesday's class. There is not a lot of direct material on the US adopting a 35 hour week but we can draw from the French experience.

Debate Topic for Dec 3 class

Hope you enjoyed your Thanksgiving. This Wednesday our class will debate one of the topics for the Dec 13 Tournament. The title is: Slot machines in the DC Metro area will do more harm than good. On the Chatterbox site I have collected some materials to help you summarise some pro and con arguments . If you are going to cite a survey or research please remember the name of the source. You are encouraged to look beyond this basic package especially for research which shows actual results from when slot machines have been introduced in other States or Countries.

Think about pro and con case lines for this topic so when we debate it on Wednesday we can apply this case line :  e.g. the pain of extra gambling is better than higher taxes, or the benefit for children's education outweighs the costs of gambling addition for adults

We want to improve our rebuttal so as you make your arguments for one side think how you would refute this argument and note it down. Then think how you would convince a judge your argument is better.

On Wednesday we will select four students to argue the positive i.e.slots do more harm and four to debate the con argument they do more good than harm. 

Please come ready with WRITTEN notes, a blank flow chart and a pen to write with.

The following week we have to cover two topics before the Dec 13 tournament so I am going to suggest we either do an extended lesson (my preference) or we do an extra class on the Tuesday Dec 9. Could students and parents let me know their preference at next weeks class. 

New DebateTopics for Dec 13

These are the topics for Dec 13. We miss next week's class so we will
need to get going on topic one tomorrow.

Tomorrow we will all initially meet in room 110 to go over Saturday's
debate then break into our class groups.

If students could jott down some arguments (and facts!) for topic 1 that wld great

1 Middle School students should not have weekend homework
2 Slot machines in the DC region will do more than good
3 The U.S. should have a 35 hour week
4 The U.S. should stop funding the international space station

Class postponed till Thursday this week

We are having a combined class this Thursday in room 128 for the debating club at the usual time. Please come ready to debate the final topic. As this is our final class before Saturday's tournament we will also review the arguments for the other three topics.

Debate Tournament at Lab School this Saturday

We have a big week this week. The debate tournament is on for this Saturday November 15 at the Lab School (4759 Reservoir Road, NW Washington DC) from 8:30 am. If you have not already done so could you please advise Mrs Kass if you are NOT able to attend this Saturday by end of school tomorrow please (Monday). Once we have the number of students sorted we will group them into teams and work out transport, chaperone's etc. 

We will be debating the four topics on this web site so students should come with pro and con arguments summarized for each topic, On Saturday you will get about 15 minutes warning if you are debating the pro or con side.

Try to find examples to support your arguments and have in mind what is your most impactful argument so you can build your case around this line. For the electoral college debate lets try and use some of the results of last week's Presidential election as examples. This is a useful site. 

On Wednesday we will debate the 4th topic -- The Internet should be regulated by an international body.

This is an example of a topic which is difficult to research and requires us to build our own arguments. I have summarized some points to consider --you may want to add some more -- and ask if you could come to Wednesday's class with some arguments and examples for both sides of this debate. This includes those who can't make this Saturdays debate. 

November 8 debate postponed

The DC Debate League has postponed trhe debate from this Saturday to Saturday week 15 November. This means we will have only one class this week on Wednesday as usual . We will be debating The electoral college should be abolished.



Please come ready to debate ! We are going to try to have each speaker talk for five minutes

Debate prep for our first tournament

Great effort on our second topic: The District of Columbia should be the 51st State. 

As discussed we still have two more debates to prepare for ahead of our first tournament Saturday November 8

These are :

3. The electoral college should be abolished.
4. The Internet should be regulated by an international body.

To ensure we are ready for Saturday week I think we will need to do an extra class next week and am proposing Thursday after school at Westland (subject to Westland MS approval)

Could you prepare a flow sheet with a summary of the arguments for and against for both these topics for Wed and Thursday respectively.

The arguments just need to be in the first two columns and can be summarised with some good persuasive examples to back them up. (IE keep it short and simple --it does not need to be an essay !!)

Remember you only need three or four arguments for each side and that some times the "emotional" argument can win over the "important" argument !

Next week we want to work a bit more on our refutation, especially for the second and third speakers (recall: they say/we say/because/therefore)

You have some research materials in your Pocket folder for the electoral college topic plus you can link through to a neat summary of the pros and cons for the electoral college topic from this Chatterbox site  . I will put some more materials together for the Internet topic which can also be accessed through the web site at the list of topics in the right column. (As we progress we will get much better at quickly researching and breaking down topics into the key pro & con arguments. Two excellent tools are Google Notebook -- see the video at the bottom of the this Chatterbox home page -- and the Sort Fix search engine )

Finally as we discussed we need to know who is NOT a starter for next Saturday's tournament. Could you let me know by end of tomorrow if you can't make it . This will enable us to put the teams together and tell the DC Urban Debate league next Tuesday who is debating.

You all have made great progress in a short time and although some are naturally nervous about our first debate, you will feel so much more confident once you have your first debates under your belt. Most of our competitors are also beginners so many will be in the same situation as us. In any case for our teams it will be very much a training exercise, getting used to how tournaments work, what the judges are looking for, techniques for rebutting and best ways how to persuade people to your view. Having done one debate tournament I can guarantee the classes will be much more useful and fun . Hoping you can all make Saturday week.

Tom Burton